‘… crazy … going through your head … buried us all …’ I could make out snippets of what Bodie was saying. He saw my confusion and walked right up to me, his voice cutting through the chime. ‘I said that was crazy. You could have got us all killed.’
‘Few more seconds and the suits would have been through the door,’ I replied in a voice so distant it sounded like someone else’s. ‘You saw how many there were, and that was just the first group. If they’d got the elevator working again then there would have been dozens of the bastards up here, dogs too. You think we had enough ammo to hold them off?’
‘Yeah,’ Bodie said, staring down the tunnel. ‘I mean no. But that was a little drastic, don’t you think?’
‘And some warning would have been nice,’ added Zee. ‘You singed off my eyebrows.’ He looked up at me and tried his best to smile. ‘Looks like I’m not the only one.’
I raised my hand to my forehead, felt the smooth skin above my eyes, painful to the touch. A quick look at Bodie and I realised that’s why he hadn’t looked like himself.
‘You both look like eggs,’ I said. ‘I could paint –’
‘You think this is the right time for beauty tips?’ snapped Bodie.
‘We’re alive, aren’t we?’ I replied, checking my leg to see a couple of tiny holes in my skin from the lead shot. They must have been ricochets, I’d been lucky. ‘Come on, let’s get this mess sorted, find out if everyone’s okay.’
I ignored Bodie’s muttered comments and turned to the first boy I could see, struggling to extract himself from a pile of dust and debris. Aside from a little bruising and a lot of shock – and the absence of his eyebrows – he seemed to be okay. I told him to head to the canteen,saying someone would be in there soon to give him a proper examination. The next kid was the same, traumatised but in one piece, and gradually there was a ragged line of Skulls and Fifty-Niners weaving unsteadily towards the slop room.
Minutes later everybody had migrated to the cooler air on the other side of the yard, leaving Zee and me alone with the remaining Skulls and two broken bodies by the door. Bodie had covered their faces with scraps of overalls and was kneeling beside them speaking under his breath. I stood there awkwardly until he had finished.
‘They were good kids,’ he said, standing up and wiping a tear from his eye. ‘Good men, I mean. Knew them both from the street, soldiers then and always. They would have wanted to go fighting.’
Zee and I shared a look but Bodie didn’t catch it. He tapped his fist over his chest twice, imitated by the small crowd, then turned back to the tunnel.
‘We should check it,’ he said. ‘Make sure it’s clear.’
‘Need to barricade it too,’ I added. ‘There will be more suits where that lot came from, and the more we take out the madder they’ll get.’
‘No doubt,’ said Bodie. ‘After you.’
I stumbled over the twisted metal door frame, almost slipping on a pile of loose rock as I walked into the tunnel. The only light was a bulb from the control room which blinked on and off like it was giving a secret signal, that and the tireless glow from the fire in the yard. Zee grabbed my arm, using it to keep his balance as he followed. Together we slipped and stumbled through the flickering darkness, half expecting a blacksuit to rise from the ashes to take revenge for his brothers.
‘What the hell happened back there?’ I asked, hoping my voice would keep the shadows at bay. ‘How did you get the doors open?’
‘I hotwired the master controls,’ Zee said, stepping round a mound of what might have been shotgun barrels or splintered bones. ‘The doors were on a fail-safe circuit, and once I’d rerouted the wires I managed to trick the main door into thinking the inner door was closed. Trouble was …’
Something moved up ahead, not seen but heard, and we stopped. The bulb winked on, the weak light struggling, and we saw more debris fall from the ceiling.
‘Trouble was,’ Zee continued as we started up again, ‘I had to switch some of the electrical connections round as well. And the second I’d split the power to the door circuit I realised I’d diverted it back to the lower elevator as well.’ He laughed, although I could tell it was strained. ‘Man, you should have seen my face when I heard it coming up. Those doors swing so damn slow that by the time I’d got them both open the suits were almost on me. And you know the rest of the story.’
We stepped out of the tunnel into the control room. The door at this end had fared less well, pulled completely from the wall and resting against the elevator. I could see that the cabin hadn’t quite made it to the top,the layer of debris we’d thrown stopping its progress when its roof had reached knee height. But there had been enough space for the suits to crawl out.
‘Jeez Louise,’ whistled Zee. ‘This place is messed up.’
He was right. The control room was completely black, as if quarried from coal. The bank of electronic equipment was nothing but a puddle of melted plastic and metal, only a handful of wires still visible. I turned to Zee, saw him chewing his lower lip, knew he was chewing on his thoughts as well.
‘What?’ I asked. He turned to see Bodie and the Skulls enter the room, then leant in towards me.
‘You want the good news or the bad?’ he whispered, not waiting for an answer. ‘Good is that the warden can’t control much of anything without a control room. Bad is that neither can we.’
I looked at him, shaking my head to show I didn’t get what he meant. He flashed another look at the Skulls before directing more soft words into my ear.
‘I’m saying that this was the only place we could have accessed the controls for the main elevator. And without them …’ I felt my heart sink, turning to Zee as we finished his statement together:
‘We’re trapped.’
THE CALM BEFORE THE STORM
We stood in the middle of the control room for what seemed like forever, trying to collect our thoughts. Zee was kicking out at the surreal sculpture of melted equipment as though he could miraculously salvage something from the mess, but it was a lost cause.
‘What this place used to be?’ asked Bodie, staggering over a small hill of rubble and rock to get to the elevator. He bent down and tentatively stuck his head inside, squinting into the darkness beneath his feet.
‘Just a room,’ blurted Zee, looking at me uneasily. ‘Nothing special like.’
‘And this thing leads down to where the warden is?’ Bodie asked, removing his head and rattling the charred remains of the elevator gates.
‘Yeah,’ Zee and I confirmed together. I finished:‘The only way up or down from the lower levels.’
Bodie grinned, his teeth a flash of diamonds against the dark room.
‘Looks like the tables have turned,’ he said.‘You blew this baby up good and true, Alex. It ain’t going nowhere now.’ He stuck his head back into the darkness of the shaft, which reminded me of a lion’s mouth, and when he spoke next he was shouting. ‘Hey, warden, you hear me down there? You hear what we’s saying? You our prisoners now, we got the gates right here and you ain’t never getting back up. You hear?’
We all held our breath to listen for a reply, but the underbelly of the prison was too far below. It was satisfying to imagine the warden hearing Bodie’s words, though. I pictured him seething, foaming at the mouth as his frustration battled with his rage, taking it out on the poor suits who had suddenly found themselves fighting on the wrong side in a war that took no prisoners.
Ha, no prisoners, I thought to myself, my burned face stinging as my lips curled into a smile. That’s funny, Alex.
For some reason the voice in my head made me think of Donovan, and the smile quickly vanished. I wished he was here, more than anything, more than I wished we could find a way out. He deserved to be here. And he’d have been so good in this fight, he’d have known exactly what to do. But he wasn’t. He was dead. I had killed him.
I felt the lump rising in my throat, so big that it was like a living thing trying to claw its way out of my
windpipe. I made for the tunnel, not caring that I was tripping and slipping on the broken floor, just wanting to get out of the darkness, away from the smell of death.
‘Alex?’ Zee shouted after me. ‘You got a plan? Alex?’
I didn’t stop, lurching over the debris like Frankenstein’s monster as I struggled to get back into the yard. Only when I was out from the tunnel, the massive prison yard the closest thing I was going to get to fresh air, did I calm down.
I’m sorry, D, I thought, then I said the same words aloud.
‘What?’ said Zee, who had followed me. ‘You say something? If you’ve gotta plan then you gotta tell me.’
‘No plan,’ I said.
‘We just keep working at the main elevator,’ came Bodie’s voice, echoing from the tunnel. He appeared moments later. ‘We get it open, and we find out how to make it work. You reckon we can blow the doors off with another can of gas?’
Both Zee and I shook our heads together.
‘Did you not have your eyes open in there?’ I said. ‘We use gas on the elevator then it’s stuck down here for good, and so are we.’
Bodie nodded, the cogs in his head practically visible through his eyes. After a moment or two he walked over to the elevator doors and scooped up a pickaxe that was leaning against them. Simon was standing there, nursing a burn on his giant arm from the explosion but otherwise fine. He was already holding his axe, examining several pale white marks on the steel doors, the only evidence that anyone had tried to break through.
‘Okay,’ Bodie said, resting the axe over his shoulder. The Skulls had gathered around him again, waiting for their orders, a few Fifty-Niners and other kids too. ‘We’ll carry on working on the doors. Pug, Clay, Omar, you take the ammo we’ve got left and set up in there,’ he pointed back towards the tunnel. ‘Make sure nothing comes up from below.’
The three Skulls started collecting shotguns, ejecting cartridges from breeches. I watched with growing dismay as the pile of red shells reached seven then stopped. They split the ammo between them, leaving one shotgun with a single shell for Bodie before heading back through the vault door.
‘Alex, Zee, gonna need your help with the door,’ Bodie said.
‘Give me a minute or so,’ I replied. ‘Just got something I need to take care of.’
I walked off, Zee sticking to my side, the clang of picks on steel like a tuneless serenade marking our departure. Around us the inmates seemed to have calmed down, the explosion hammering home the fact that this had turned into something bad, something deadly. Most sat on the landings, legs dangling over the yard, watching the Skulls at work. Their attention turned to me as I passed beneath them, and every time I glanced up I saw firelight reflected in their eyes, like they were demons waiting to pounce.
‘Got something in mind?’ asked Zee. ‘Or did you just fancy a stroll?’
I didn’t answer, merely led the way around the outside of the huge yard towards the shower rooms. Ducking my head through the crack in the rock I saw what I was looking for, a bundle of white against the red floor. I pulled off my jacket, wincing as my aching muscles protested.
‘No point in washing,’ commented Zee. ‘Things are just gonna get messy again.’
I breathed a laugh through my nose, too soft for Zee to hear, then unbuttoned my shirt.
‘Little privacy would be nice,’ I said. Zee didn’t move, his eyes on my chest as I threw the ruined uniform to the floor.
‘Holy …’ he started. ‘Alex, how are you still even walking?’
I looked down, saw the claw marks that had gouged three huge trails across my chest. Around them was a patchwork of scars, some still with stitches from my surgery, the skin barely able to contain the bulging flesh beneath. There were bruises too, so many that I looked like I’d been swimming in grape juice. Most were already starting to heal, turning an ugly shade of mottled yellow.
‘Nectar,’ I answered, prodding a gash that had opened up in my side and wondering how I’d got it. The wound was already sealed with a layer of clotted black blood, the poison hard at work saving my life. There couldn’t be much left in me now. ‘Got to be grateful to the warden for something, I guess.’
‘Yeah, that and your pecs, dude,’ said Zee. ‘Man, you look like a Mr Universe or something. Girls are gonna go wild for you when you get out of here.’
We both laughed softly. I flexed an arm, seeing my bicep swell to the size of a melon. It was impressive, yes, but the sight of it made me feel like I was going to hurl again. That wasn’t my muscle under there, it was something age old and rotten stitched beneath my skin. Luckily Zee broke the tension by flexing his own arms. He looked like a rake holding two chopsticks.
‘Reckon I can pull some fitties with these too,’ he said, and this time our laughter surged across the room like running water. ‘Seriously though, Alex, what did the warden do to you?’
‘It’s complicated,’ I said, not even sure where to begin. ‘I don’t know what it is, I just know what it does. It makes me strong, Zee, gives me power I never ever imagined. But …’ Zee didn’t prompt me, waiting patiently for me to continue. ‘But the price you pay for that power is, I don’t know; you lose yourself, in anger,in hatred. The more it happens, the more of your personality is scratched away. If it happens too much then I’m going to end up an animal, like the rats, like Gary.’
Zee frowned, then started giggling. I looked up at him, not quite believing it.
‘What?’ I asked.
‘Alex, what you’re telling me is that the warden turned you into the Incredible Hulk.’
‘What?’ I repeated, my voice an octave higher.
‘You no like me when I’m angry,’ Zee growled, and this time I laughed alongside him. ‘Hulk smash!’ He stomped around the room for a few seconds banging his hands on his chest like a gorilla, then calmed down, wiping the tears from his eyes. ‘You haven’t even told me why we’re standing in the showers.’
I turned away from Zee and removed my trousers, trying not to look at the scars that ran the length of my trunk-like legs.
‘Okay,’ said Zee. ‘Now I’m really worried …’
‘Just hang on a sec,’ I said, groaning like an old man as I bent down and rummaged through the pile. Most of the prison overalls were way too small for me, but after a bit of a hunt I found some that had been stretched thin by time. I slowly slotted my feet in, pulling the upper half over my back. It was tight around the arms, and when I moved it tore under both of my pits, but other than that it seemed to be fine.
‘Does my bum look big in this?’ I asked, giving Zee a clumsy twirl.
‘Your everything looks big in that,’ he answered. ‘You sure you want to trade that smart, comfortable suit for prison rags?’
‘Yeah, I’m sure.’ I picked up the suit, scrunching it into a ball. ‘I’m one of you, Zee, I’m a prisoner, not a blacksuit. They may have dressed me in someone else’s flesh, but they can’t make me wear the suit, not now.’
‘But what if you need it later on?’ he said. ‘Like a disguise or something.’
‘They know who I am. There’s no more pretending. And anyway, I’d rather die wearing the same uniform as you – as everyone – than spend another second in this.’
We stood for a moment, listening to droplets of water fall from the shower heads, suddenly aware of the immense blanket of quiet draped across the room.
‘You think we will?’ Zee said softly. ‘Die, I mean.’
‘I wouldn’t give us great odds,’ I replied. ‘But we made it this far, right?’
‘Right.’
‘And now there’s only a set of steel doors between us and freedom.’
‘Well, the elevator doors, yeah, plus the blacksuits beneath us and the guards up in the Black Fort. And the electrified fence and the gates, not to mention Alfred Furnace and whatever he brings to the party. Oh, and the police as well, if we ever do make it as far as the streets.’
‘Yeah, that too. But mainly just the doors.’
‘Speaking of which,’ Zee said, ‘we should probably go give them a hand.’
We walked out without another word, leaving the silence and stillness of the shower rooms behind us. This time I didn’t take the route around the outside of the yard but headed for the middle where the bonfire still blazed. I could feel its heat against my skin from thirty metres away, like invisible hands pushing me back. But I kept walking until the mound of burning sheets towered above me. It’s not like I could lose my eyebrows again.
I tossed the suit onto the fire, watching tongues of flame lick around it as if they were tasting to see what it was. Then a mouth seemed to open up in the inferno,swallowing the suit with a roar of satisfaction. I watched until there was nothing left but smoke. If only there was a way to destroy all evidence of the warden’s work so easily.
‘Burn in hell,’ I said, wishing I could have thought of something more original to say, and something more deserving to say it to. Then the heat became too much and I backed off, making for the elevator. It might have been my imagination but I thought the looks I got walking across the yard were softer – not so much friendlier as less hateful. I still looked like a blacksuit, but I’d chosen my colours. I was wearing prison stripes. I was one of them.
Simon was standing by the elevator talking to Zee, pickaxe in his giant hand and sweat pouring from him. He saw me coming and did a double take.
‘Nice kit,’ he said. ‘Although it could do with some TLC.’
I was looking down at the holes in my uniform, at the threads which snaked out from every seam, when I heard something power up above my head. I staggered back instinctively, everyone else doing the same, eyes glued to the huge monitor mounted above the elevator doors. The screen flickered on, a white Furnace logo rotating lazily on a black background. Then the image parted to reveal a sight that forced screams and shouts of distress across the prison.
Death Sentence Page 17
