Mind Blind

by Lari Don

  “Did you lose it like this?” she asked again.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you care? Did you try to… stop it?”

  “Yes. Yes. I did. Both.” I spoke softly. I wasn’t proud of my answers.

  “I can’t read your mind. I don’t know if you’re lying. I don’t know if I can trust you.”

  “You can’t trust me. But I’m not lying.”

  “Did you fight them? When they were killing her?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “It was too late.”

  “Why did she die?”

  “Because…” I stopped. If I said Vivien died because she saw my face, then Lucy would know that she was almost certainly dead too. “I can’t tell you.”

  “Why not?”

  “She died because of what she knew. And I don’t want… you to… em…”

  “You’re trying to protect me?”

  I shrugged.

  “Don’t bother. Don’t you bother protecting me! Why would I want your protection when all you did when my sister was dying was whinge a little? Is that what you did? Then what? What did you do next?”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “Did you have a wobble, did you run off because it was all too heavy? Did you run off and leave her to die?”

  I closed my eyes. I felt it all again.

  My face in her head. Her terror. Her panic. Her mind switching off.

  But I didn’t fall into her death. Lucy’s hate and contempt battered me back into the taxi, anchored me to the present, pulled me away from the nothingness of Vivien.

  “You did! You ran off! You left her to die! You weak wimping wobbling pathetic scum. That’s worse than having the guts to kill her yourself. I hope it hurts. I hope all the pain and death in the world hurt you for ever…”

  I couldn’t defend myself.

  Was she right?

  Was I worse than Malcolm?

  I’d never actually killed anyone. But I’d been involved in grabs before. I knew what could happen to the targets. And even after feeling Vivien’s misery and fear, I’d been ready to do it again the next day, to track an undercover cop and betray him to his death, if I’d been allowed to go along.

  I’d always known I was crap.

  But now I saw myself through Lucy’s eyes.

  And I wasn’t just crap.

  I was a wimp.

  A coward.

  Weak.

  Evil.

  I hated myself. I hated myself so much I could probably block out the world, but I let it in. Let it rip me apart.

  Lucy stewed in her grief and hate, ignoring me, looking out the window.

  And we drove steadily through London. Towards the train, towards Scotland, towards the urn, the ashes, the answers.

  CHAPTER 23

  Ciaran Bain, 30th October

  It was a quiet journey.

  Lucy was concentrating on not crying.

  And I couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t a pathetic excuse for my behaviour. A pathetic excuse for my life.

  We were starting to drive through bits of London I recognised from the telly.

  Then I sensed a hunter. Focussed. Searching. Ready to attack. Patient, but burning with anger. Malcolm.

  “Stop!” I slammed the plastic shutter open and screamed at the driver. “Stop!”

  He slowed down. Slightly. “But I thought you had a train to catch? We’re nearly at Euston!”

  “Turn round,” I insisted. “Drive away from the station.”

  “He hates being early,” Lucy explained. “We can’t go to the station yet. Please, turn round.”

  At last, as I felt my uncle’s rising spikes of interest, the driver U-turned on the empty street and drove away from Euston. Shaking his head, wishing we were out of his taxi.

  Lucy looked at me suspiciously. “What’s going on?”

  I moved to the back seat and whispered, “My family are at the station. Staking it out. Waiting for me. I sensed their concentration.”

  “Did they… sense… you?”

  “I don’t think I was near enough for them to sense me. But I’m not sure. This bloody driver drove on for at least a couple of blocks after I detected them, then hung about far too long…”

  “We were near enough for you to sense them, but not for them to sense you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Can you read minds further away than they can? Are you better at this than them?”

  I choked on a laugh as the taxi stopped at deserted traffic lights. “Better? No one else collapses when they’re reading, so ‘better’ is not how I’d describe it.”

  I moved back to the seat behind the driver. I could think more clearly when I wasn’t right beside Lucy. I asked her to check bus times to Edinburgh on her phone, while I worked out what to do.

  “Bus times? But no one takes the bus!”

  “Precisely. That’s why we’re going to take the bus.” I remembered what I knew about exit routes. “The buses go from Victoria, which is a nice long way from here.”

  I took my own phone off silent and checked my messages. I ignored four from my mum, but opened a very recent one from Roy:

  Keep moving. U came 2 close. They’re on to u.

  Shit.

  “Lucy. They know I’m here.”

  She looked up. “The first bus from Victoria isn’t until nine o’clock.”

  “You have to go to the bus station on your own. Buy our tickets.” I hauled out a handful of notes and gave them to her. “Then buy a book, something totally unlike our night, no chases or police. Buy a romance or something historical. Find a dark corner, get your head down and read the book. Lose yourself in the story completely. Don’t think about me or my family or being on the run.”

  She was going to argue. I put my hands up. “Please, Lucy. I’m going to lead my family to Kings Cross as a decoy, then I’ll get away and join you. Just do what I say. Please.”

  She wasn’t convinced.

  “Do we trust each other?” I asked.

  We both shook our heads.

  “But will you be there, waiting?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’ll find you.” Which sounded more like a threat than a promise, but I couldn’t do any better.

  I handed the taxi driver another note. “Take her to Victoria Coach Station. Thanks, mate.”

  Then I turned back to Lucy. “See you there?”

  She nodded, still surprised by the speed of our changing plans.

  I jumped out of the taxi, to run straight back to my family.

  I sprinted away from Lucy and her on/off hate, towards Euston, towards Malcolm and his constant anger.

  My family knew the exit routes out of London too. They’d know that once I realised they were at Euston, the next obvious place for me to go was Kings Cross, not far away. So I’d lead them there, then run like a rabbit north, as if I was looking for another station on the route to Scotland. Then when I was out of range, when they couldn’t sense me, I’d circle south to the coach station.

  And I’d try not to worry that I was on foot or paying taxis, and couldn’t get either a train or a plane, and that my family had unlimited cash, and cars.

  Lucy Shaw, 30th October

  He sprinted towards the station.

  Running straight at danger, as fast as he could.

  Idiot.

  At least he was getting to do something.

  I, on the other hand, had been ordered to sit in a corner and read a book about corsets and tapestries.

  What if his family caught him?

  What if he changed his mind and joined up with them again?

  What if he was planning to get the train to Edinburgh on his own and reach my uncle before me?

  I had no idea what he was going to do. Which was unfair, because he always knew what I was going to do.

  But I could find out what he was doing.

  I wasn’t sure how his mindreading worked, but if he c
ould detect his family and the police on the other side of buildings, he’d detect me if I followed behind him in a taxi.

  However I knew where he was going. Or at least, where he said he was going. So I could get there first.

  I wouldn’t even break my promise to him. I’d plenty of time before the bus was due to leave, so I would still get to Victoria before him.

  I leant forward and spoke to the taxi driver, whose face, never mind thoughts, I could read easily. “Don’t take me to Victoria, please, take me to Kings Cross, but go the long way round.”

  I wanted to know if I could trust this boy, if this family existed. So I’d go to Kings Cross and watch what happened. I’d even use his advice to hide my mind in a story. If it would work on his family, presumably it would work on him too.

  The taxi driver was shaking his head. “You kids just can’t make up your minds, can you?”

  “I’ll get out at Kings Cross and you can keep all that change.”

  Ciaran Bain, 30th October

  I couldn’t run straight at them. I had to give the impression of sneaking past, of fear, of incompetence.

  From where I was now, getting to Kings Cross meant going right past the entrance to Euston.

  So I walked slowly along the pavement towards Euston. Like I was uncertain about what I’d sensed. Like I was hoping the fright five minutes ago was a mistake.

  I could sense them, waiting and searching, but they couldn’t quite sense me yet.

  I was glancing around me like a rabbit in the middle of a field, looking for boltholes.

  I had to be nervous, on the verge of panic, not checking my surroundings efficiently because I was too scared to concentrate. Then it might be plausible that I wouldn’t notice them. And when it became so obvious they were onto me that I couldn’t ignore it, then I could panic and bolt.

  I let the questions I’d been forcing down all night crash to the surface.

  What the hell was I doing?

  Why was I disobeying Malcolm?

  Why was I undermining Mum?

  I allowed myself to be a mess of perfectly genuine doubts and fears. I was moving erratically, acting conspicuously, letting my emotions overtake my training.

  I was that idiot boy, Bain, making a mess of it again, being exactly as useless as Malcolm always knew I was.

  But while I walked I was also scanning for my way out.

  I sensed a spike of interest from Euston. At last. They had noticed me. I tried to ignore it for as long as possible, giving off nerves and uncertainty. I sensed a hunter homing in, but I kept the panicked questions circling round my head.

  Would I ever be able to go home?

  Would I have to keep running all my life?

  Then more hunters, a pack, all grasping after my trail of emotions.

  When I reached the red circle of Euston Square Underground, I couldn’t ignore them any more. The spikes of interest from ahead were too strong. They were starting to organise. They were coming for me.

  So I acted like panicking prey, and decided that it was just as fast to keep running forward to Kings Cross as it was to turn round and run away.

  I changed direction like that terrified rabbit, hurdled the railing and sprinted to the other side of the road, which wasn’t the direct route to Kings Cross but would give me a little distance from the hunters.

  I ran faster than I’d ever run round our track at home. I ran for my life. I didn’t care if they knew it. I wasn’t pretending at all. I was being hunted. So I ran.

  Of course, they could run too. And they could use their cars. But I had a headstart and I wasn’t faffing about giving orders like I could sense Malcolm doing.

  So I ran at a hellishly fast pace along the wide road. The family hadn’t posted anyone on the outer perimeter, they all had to get out of Euston past a row of shops, the parked buses at the stances outside and a narrow park. Someone got tangled up. Roy was falling over again.

  They were so close now I could even hear Uncle Paul yelling. Now I was past Euston and on my way to Kings Cross. But I was too visible, the only person on this early morning pavement.

  I heard a car screeching round a corner. I didn’t look. I just kept running.

  They were chasing me as I ran towards Kings Cross, which was the first part of the plan. But I couldn’t let them catch me, so I took the first right-hand turning and hurtled down it.

  I’d got their attention, now I had to get away.

  Lucy Shaw, 30th October

  Kings Cross was quieter than I’d ever seen, because there weren’t many trains this early. But the newsagent was open, taking delivery of papers, so I bought a book, just like I’d been told.

  I didn’t read in a dark corner, because it isn’t good for your eyes. I sat under the edge of the curving triangles roof, where the boy would cross my eye-line when he came in. I couldn’t think about searching for him, I had to concentrate on the book, so that anyone reading my mind only saw glimpses of lovelorn maidens in inconvenient skirts.

  I lost myself in a story and waited to see if he had been telling the truth.

  Ciaran Bain, 30th October

  I turned left, parallel to the main road, heading in the direction of Kings Cross. This was definitely the centre of London. Even the back streets were filled with curved white windows and black iron balconies, blurring in the corner of my eye as I ran.

  Malcolm and Daniel were excellent at pinpointing the location of a mind, but I hoped I was running fast enough that I was hard to pin down.

  I hurtled around corners, past posh shops and little cafes, sensing screams of mental annoyance behind me as my pursuers got snarled up in the maze of back streets.

  I was also searching, under all the erratic rabbit running, for my real way out.

  I heard a couple of cars screeching one block over, past the heaving of my breath and pounding of blood in my ears. I was in good shape, but I couldn’t keep up this pace much longer.

  I was running towards a pub with flower baskets hanging over its windows, when I sensed them getting closer. Not the hunters on foot, they hadn’t a hope of catching me. But the hunters in the cars were ignoring one-way streets and red lights, trying to cut me off.

  Then I sensed the mind I had been hoping for, my way out.

  But I also sensed…

  Shit!

  I also sensed what I should have anticipated.

  I wasn’t just running from Malcolm’s team at Euston. I was running towards another team at Kings Cross.

  Of course. They had both obvious boltholes covered.

  The family must have sensed my genuine shock. Now I could legitimately turn and run north, like I was trying to run all the way to Edinburgh.

  So I headed for the mind I’d detected a moment ago. A patiently waiting mind, a working but resting mind.

  I could win on foot for a short distance, but for a race halfway across London, I needed wheels. I turned a corner and found the black cab of a taxi driver hoping for an early morning fare.

  As I got in the taxi, Malcolm noticed my change of direction, my change of intention. He went into Sergeant Major mode, new orders exploding around him.

  I told the driver to head north, on the same bearing as the train line, so the family would think I was searching for the next station any Leeds or York or Edinburgh trains would stop at. But as she drove off, I sensed one more thing.

  A single mind. Past the chasing tail from Euston and the waiting ring at Kings Cross. A familiar mind, but not family. A mind muffled by second-hand emotions like someone reading a book or watching a film.

  It was Lucy. Hiding in a story, but not at Victoria. At Kings Cross.

  I yelled, “Stop!” at the driver.

  What was Lucy doing?

  I couldn’t go and get her. I had to get away myself.

  She’d chosen to ignore my advice. She’d chosen to put herself in danger.

  I had to leave her.

  I nodded to the driver and repeated my instruction to head
north.

  Then I felt a jolt of recognition. Someone had recognised Lucy.

  Was she sitting in the open?

  Idiot.

  So that was it. She was already dead. I couldn’t do anything. I had to leave her. I sat back as the taxi drove off.

  CHAPTER 24

  Lucy Shaw, 30th October

  I suddenly felt like an antelope being watched by a pride of lions, with warning tingles across my shoulders and up my neck. I kept my nose pointed at the book, but raised my eyes to glance round.

  Was the boy here? He would probably be seriously pissed off if he’d seen me. But I wasn’t scared of his anger. He always calmed down pretty fast, and he hadn’t actually attacked me since I tried to stab him.

  But it wasn’t him.

  There was a line of people looking at me, over by the brick entrance to Platforms 0–8.

  A line of people, moving towards me.

  Striding forward, in the middle, was a slim woman in heels, with bright blonde hair and too much make-up for this time in the morning.

  I recognised her. She was the Irish reporter who’d interviewed us about Nana.

  “Lucy Shaw!” she called cheerfully. “What are you doing here, dear?”

  They were spreading out like a net.

  There was the reporter, a skinny man in jeans, a shorter woman and a couple of teenage boys, a ginger spotty one and a handsome darker pony-tailed one, both tall and muscly, both with the same sour scowl that the blond burglar had when he was trying to sense the surveillance team.

  This must be his family.

  I was caught in a trap meant for him.

  I looked round in panic. The station was almost empty. No police or rail staff, just a few sleepy passengers. No one who could help.

  Could I run? His family were fanning out, blocking the nearest exit. They were walking towards me, staring at me. Were they reading my mind already?

  I was shaking with fear and with anger at my own stupidity. They had killed Viv! What would they do to me?

  The pony-tailed boy was reaching out his hand to me, staring at me with his dark eyes.