by RR Haywood
Ben stops and sags. The door is locked. He pushes it. Pulls it. Hits it and kicks it. He hammers his fists on it but it doesn’t yield and no one comes to open it. Ben stalks back into the room and grabs a chair that is slammed against the door but nothing happens. The chair is solid wood. The door is solid metal. Rage builds. Ben swings the chair from the side, then overhead. He does it again and again until the chair breaks apart but the door remains intact.
‘WHAT?’ Ben screams as he turns to Harry, but the big man stands sipping from that cup.
‘WHAT?’ Ben screams and rages and picks up a chair leg that he grips while he walks towards Harry. ‘Open the fucking door,’ Ben growls, pointing the chair leg at him.
Harry sips. Ben kicks chairs and turns a table over. He throws more chairs across the room as his mind crumbles into tiny pieces. He wants to tear his own eyes out. He wants to rip his tongue out and gouge his wrists open until he finds a vein then sink down into oblivion. Ben wants to cry and scream but Harry just slurps from that coffee cup and stares at him.
He wants to fight me. Ben can see it. Harry is staring at him to goad him. Harry slurps again, louder and longer. Ben flinches and feels the rage pounding through his skull. Harry swallows. Ben grimaces and winces and screws his face up with every ounce of his being focused on not attacking Harry.
A second of frozen time. Two seconds. Eyes locked. Intent clear. Ben doesn’t blink. Harry doesn’t blink. Ben grips the chair leg. Harry holds the coffee cup, which he lifts to his mouth. Ben winces and curls his upper lip back. Harry pauses, staring, provoking, goading. His lips reach the rim of the cup.
‘Don’t.’ Ben gives the warning fair and clear with his knuckles turning white from the grip on the chair leg that is now a weapon and in that second Ben finally sees the key hanging from a large metal ring hooked over a finger on Harry’s left hand.
‘Give me the key,’ Ben says instantly. ‘I’m going. Give me the key.’
Harry moves his head a fraction side to side.
‘Key,’ Ben growls and takes another step towards him. Harry slurps and inside Ben feels only hatred for him. ‘What . . . ?’ Ben tries to speak but his voice breaks with tension. He coughs, clearing his throat. ‘Fucking key . . .’ He holds his hand out in expectation for Harry to throw it.
Harry looks down casually at the key hanging from his finger then back at Ben and sips from the mug.
‘I’m taking that key,’ Ben tells him with another step. He drops the chair leg that lands with a dull thud on the ground. Ben stops in front of him. Within arm’s reach and so close he can see the flecks in the irises of Harry’s eyes. Harry doesn’t move. A strange sense of calm descends and Ben knows exactly what will happen if he tries to slide that hoop from Harry’s finger or even reach out to touch it. It’s not a foretelling but fact, an absolute certainty, and Ben knows within the chaos of his mind that he does not stand a chance trying to snatch it so he lifts his hand slowly and stares at the key.
Ben gets within an inch of the key. Harry’s right hand flashes out, slapping him with an open-palmed strike that snaps Ben’s head over. Ben blinks and looks back to see Harry holding the cup with both hands again.
He tries again and gets slapped again. The speed of Harry is shocking, his arm a blur of movement. Ben’s cheek stings. He goes for the key and gets slapped with a noise that’s dull and flat. His face burns. He tries again and Harry hits harder and between each slap his hand goes back to the cup. Ben moves faster, trying to snatch the key, but the slaps make him stagger to the side. He recovers and blinks. His face already swelling. Ben turns and reaches for the key in one very slow motion and gets hit harder.
Red mist descends with emotions of hurt, loss, rejection, grief, mourning, self-pity and abject misery all focusing down to a single beam of pure rage that makes Ben charge at Harry with a dull thought that he wants to die so being killed here is just as good as dying at Holborn.
Ben goes fast, throwing fists the soldier swats away with ease. Finally Harry drops the coffee mug and shoves Ben away.
‘You’re untrained,’ Harry says as though bored.
Ben throws rights and lefts that Harry dodges and moves away from with ease.
‘Undisciplined . . .’
Ben lashes out with hard punches but his arms get knocked aside as Harry pushes him in the chest, sending him back several paces.
‘Come again and I’ll beat you,’ Harry says so casually, so easily it sets Ben’s rage off even worse.
Ben charges. Incandescent with fury. Blinded by his own impotent rage. Harry shows no reaction until the very last second, then he shrugs and goes to work.
After that is a blur.
Ben can fight but Mad Harry Madden batters him round the room. Punched, pushed and thrown bodily into chairs and tables that splinter into weapons that he grabs to swing wildly, but Harry’s skill is far beyond anything Ben can throw at him.
Ben goes down but keeps getting back up until his eyes are swelling and his nose is broken. Still he gets back up. He hates this place. He hates Harry. He hates being dead. He didn’t ask for this and he doesn’t know what else to do so he keeps getting up so Harry can kill him and the pain gets worse and the blood comes faster but still he keeps getting back up.
Harry doesn’t speak but stalks about the room waiting for Ben to rise and charge before whipping left and right and smashing fists into his head. A hard punch to Ben’s stomach makes him puke on the ground with acidic bile burning his throat but he gets back up because the rage inside is so strong he cannot deny it.
‘Steph sold you out,’ Harry’s voice booms from somewhere close by. ‘Five days after you died she went to a newspaper. Told them you beat her.’
Ben reels on the spot. His mind trying to understand what Harry is telling him. He gets punched again in the side of the head, then a flurry of blows makes him sink down to his knees with blood and snot drooling from his mouth.
‘She knew you were Ben Ryder. Said you threatened her. Said you’d kill her if she ever told anybody . . .’
‘No.’ Ben gargles the word out and shakes his head but still rises.
‘I don’t like wife-beaters.’ A hand grips Ben’s hair and snaps his head back. Harry’s mouth close to his ear. ‘Steph said you beat her. She said Ben Ryder was a violent man . . .’
‘No.’ Ben tries to shake his head but Harry grips too hard and yanks back while his knee drives forward into Ben’s spine, pinning him in place on the blood-soaked floor.
‘. . . Said you hit her. Said you beat her. Told the world you beat her . . .’ Harry rasps the words out with almost malicious delight. ‘She was going to leave you the day you died . . .’
We need to talk tonight.
‘. . . Was having an affair . . .’ We need to talk tonight. ‘. . . leaving you for him . . .’ We need to talk tonight. ‘. . . wife-beater . . .’
Ben flails side to side as chunks of hair are ripped out. Harry tries to pin him but he thrashes and breaks free with fresh energy pulsing in his body. On all fours and with blood pouring from his face Ben crawls away but Harry stalks after him. Kicking him over on to his side then planting a big foot on his chest.
‘I don’t like wife-beaters . . .’
‘I didn’t . . . Steph . . . loves . . . I love . . .’
Harry drops down, his face hovering a few inches above Ben. ‘You beat her. You hit her. Worthless maggot. Said you forced yourself on her the night before you died . . .’
‘NO!’ Ben screams at him, spraying blood from his mouth that flecks Harry’s cheek. He wipes it away and glares down.
‘Said you forced yourself. Said you beat her. Told the world . . .’
Fuck me, Ben. Fuck me harder.
‘Said she . . . was in love with someone else but was too scared to tell you . . . said you threatened her . . . said you . . .’
Images flash through Ben’s mind of Steph in their bedroom turning away to look at her phone. Pulling her towel off. Her text messages. T
he sex they had the night before. Safa came into his room. Safa smiling at him as he held her hand to explain parallel worlds. Safa and Steph.
‘Worthless maggot . . .’
‘I didn’t . . .’
‘Wife-beater. Coward . . .’
‘I didn’t . . .’ Ben tries to rise but Harry leans harder on his leg, pushing his foot into Ben’s chest.
‘You’re nothing. You deserve to die like a wife-beating maggot that—’
‘I DIDN’T,’ Ben screams at him.
‘WIFE-BEATER,’ Harry’s foot lifts and the big man bends down in one smooth motion to grip Ben’s top and lifts him bodily with one hand to hold him an inch in front of his face. ‘COWARD . . . MAGGOT . . .’ Spittle hits Ben’s lips. ‘WORTHLESS LITTLE MAN . . .’ He shakes Ben, one-handed and with ease. Ragging back and forth. ‘RAPIST . . .’
Ben reaches the nadir of despair. Time slows to a state that he’s had three times before. Everything in perfect clarity but fuelled by unspent rage, loss, rejection and hurt. He snaps with pure, unbridled fury that has his fist smashing into Harry’s nose and following through with lashing blows one after the other. Harry staggers back from the unexpected onslaught. Up to now it was easy, but now it becomes work and the soldier rallies to counter with more devastating punches that hammer into Ben’s already bruised and battered head. Months of training. Months of being thrown about by Safa and Harry and although there was no effort from Ben, the lessons sunk in. The constant reminders to lift his guard. To block and counter. To aim and pivot when he hits. To move and weave. To grip, twist, heave, throw and fight like a professional.
The juxtaposition is stark. Ben’s ability to fight and stay coldly detached are mixed with the wild rage driving him on and it makes Harry fight harder and harder still. For minutes they go at it. Moving round the room with brutal explosions of violence that slam fists into faces, heads, bodies and limbs. Locks are applied and countered. Throws are attempted and thwarted. The blood flows and mixes with the sweat pouring from their faces. This isn’t a beating now. This isn’t a lesson being given. This is a fight. A hard, gritty, nasty fight between two men who know what they are doing. The years of experience and the lack of rage give Harry the edge and he is forced to inflict injury to slow his opponent.
Confusion grows inside Ben. Fear and worry. Steph told everyone those things? She knew he was Ben Ryder? It fuels him. The idea of it, but as shocking as it is, somehow it makes sense. He asked Safa to tell him about Steph and she clammed up. Ben knew Steph was having an affair and figured that was the thing Safa was holding back. A swirling mix of memories and emotions. Safa and Harry teaching him how to fight. Steph’s coldness and biting tone. Safa refusing to talk about Steph and becoming almost aggressive every time Ben mentioned her. ‘This is who I am . . . I want my life . . . I want to be with Steph.’ Safa hit him. She hit him across the face when he said he wanted to be with Steph. Safa came into his room.
Those thoughts create enough distraction and lack of focus for Harry to strike hard. The lights go out and Ben feels the floor coming up to meet him. He comes awake, slurred and slow. Pain in every part of his body. Thoughts so confused that he can’t function. He rolls over and starts rising. Unable to see through one eye. His mouth so swollen he can’t speak. Where is he? He is fighting someone that hits him over and over until the pain is so intense it becomes a new dimension within his range of senses.
‘Stay down man!’ Harry pleads. Ben doesn’t stay down. He clambers to his feet, sucking ragged breath and fixing Harry with his right eye. Ben spits blood and puke and feels his teeth rattling loose but staggers towards Harry and flails into him.
‘Enough, Ben . . .’
Not enough. Never enough. He has to die. He is not meant to be here. He has to go back to . . . I have to go home to . . .
‘For the love of God . . . Stop it, Ben.’
Home. Steph. Safa. Steph didn’t love him. Steph sold him out. Steph told the world he beat and raped her. Safa came to his room. Safa carried him.
‘You fool.’ The voice comes plaintive and whispered but Ben turns towards it and swings an arm that gets gripped and held, so he headbutts instead and blacks out again. Flashes of images. A bearded man looking at him with real worry in his features. Ben hits him. Harry takes the hit and stares down with a rare show of emotion.
‘I take it back,’ Harry says in a tone full of regret and remorse for something Ben doesn’t understand. ‘You’re not weak.’
Ben blacks out again and this time he doesn’t get back up.
Harry stands over the unconscious, broken body of Ben Ryder. His own face bruised, bleeding, swollen and sore. His chest heaving. Sweat pours to mingle with the blood. He looks down at his bloodied knuckles then down again to the inert body lying in the pool of blood.
A metallic clunk, the door swings open as Safa pushes into the room to look round at the broken furniture then over to Harry standing over Ben.
‘Jesus, Harry,’ she cries out, rushing over. ‘Is he dead?’
She drops to a crouch and pushes her fingers through the blood smeared on his neck to feel for a pulse.
‘I said your way wouldn’t work,’ Harry says, wiping a bloodied hand across his battered face. ‘Is he alive?’
She nods. ‘Pulse is there, but weak.’
‘What happened?’ Roland demands, striding into the room and stopping to first stare open-mouthed at the sight of Ben and then do a quick double-take at Harry’s bloodied face. ‘Good God,’ he blurts and looks slowly round the room, taking in the devastation and blood trails. ‘He fought you? Ben fought you?’
‘Aye,’ Harry says, hardly believing it himself.
‘Is he dead?’ Roland asks.
‘No,’ Safa says.
‘You’ve got to break a man before you can rebuild him,’ Harry says weakly.
‘Rebuild him?’ Roland asks in a tight voice. ‘He’s going back before he dies . . . Malcolm?’
‘Behind you.’
‘Get Konrad, take Ben back to the tracks at Holborn.’
‘You’ll not be doing that,’ Harry whispers hoarse and low.
‘Harry,’ Roland blurts, ‘the man is spent . . . you’ve beaten him half to death already.’
‘He’ll be needing a doctor,’ Harry says, staring down at Ben.
‘Look at him,’ Roland says, holding a trembling hand out to point at Ben then round at the mess in the room. ‘He’s finished . . . he has to go back . . . he can’t die here. Where would we put the body? He can’t go back dead either. The autopsy will . . . he needs to breathe the fumes in the tunnel to get them into his lungs . . . God, Harry, he has to go back before he dies.’
‘Aye,’ Harry says, stretching his back. ‘I’ve beaten men, but none like this . . .’ He turns to look at Safa. ‘You were right.’ Safa shrugs, of course she’s right, she’s always right. ‘We’ll be keeping Ben,’ he adds. ‘Right man for the job after all.’
‘Can you get a doctor?’ Safa asks.
Roland groans. ‘Are you sure, Harry?’
‘Aye,’ Harry says.
‘Harry,’ Roland says gently. ‘Look at him. He’s done in . . .’
‘Did you tell him about Steph?’ Safa asks.
‘Aye,’ Harry says. ‘Never fought a harder man, I don’t think,’ he muses, shaking his head. ‘He came back at the end . . . reached the bottom, he did.’
‘You sure, Harry?’ Safa asks.
‘I am,’ Harry says with brutal honesty. ‘Get him a doctor, get him fixed and he’ll be the man you need . . .’
‘We’ve got a doctor in the folder,’ Malcolm cuts in.
‘Folder?’ Safa asks.
‘In the office,’ Malcolm says with a glance at Roland.
‘It is the list of people with skills for extraction,’ Roland says.
‘I’m not getting anyone else though,’ Malcolm says quickly. ‘Konrad won’t go back again either . . .’
‘We’ll go,’ Safa says quickly. ‘We’ll get
the doctor . . .’
Thirty-Two
Hope. There is always hope. Deep down he knows he will die. Hundreds of miles from any living person in a sea that two hours ago was as flat as a millpond but now rages with waves cresting metres high and bursting white froth into the wind-whipped air.
He is a good yachtsman. Experienced and risk averse, but lately his mind has been unsettled and gradually getting worse. Forgetful sometimes, absent-minded often. Recognising faces but unable to recall the name of the person. Older in years, with a bald head framed by salt-and-pepper-streaked hair and a beard to match. His lined face makes him look older, but that’s what booze does to you. Wine at dinner and whisky for supper and so his nights passed pleasantly, but then she died and those nights were not pleasant. They were long and lonely and soon the whisky was being taken at dinner, then at lunch, and so a drop of whisky for breakfast wasn’t that much of a step to take.
Alone now and nothing makes sense any more. Confusion at everything. The world moves too fast for him to keep up. New technology, new rules, new laws, new faces, new everything.
The sea will always be the sea and to this place he goes when the demons threaten to take over, but now, staring death in the face, surrounded by walls of water looming overhead, he should be quietly accepting that fate. But he doesn’t. In that second as the yacht lifts he wants life. As the boat rallies to surge up the near-vertical wall, so he wishes to reach the top and sail safely down the other side.
For over an hour now he has kept the boat facing into the waves. Climbing and dropping, rising and falling. His hands making deft adjustments to the wheel, causing the rudder to turn here, slack there and the half-empty whisky bottle rolls forgotten in the well by his feet.
He grins wide and full of terror, but feels more alive than he has done in years. His old face shedding the years of stress and depression and those lines now speak of experience and wisdom instead of worry and alcohol. Regret is there too. Regret that he has thrown the skills of his trade away to lapse into a luxury lifestyle in which he has greater concern for his social standing than for the people he could help. He wasn’t born rich and this was never the plan, but he was gifted and that gift was recognised, and only a fool turns down such a high salary, and with that salary came the perks. The house, the cars, the beautiful wife. The holidays and restaurants.
