by AD Davies
“And Julian … poor Julian. One over-enthusiastic protest against the criminals who crippled our system … demanding they, the perpetrators…” He swept the machine-gun over the huddled crowd, grinning his half-toothless grin as most cowered.
Most. A handful met the lunatic with defiance. No way would they bow to this man.
Alicia gasped as a cramp set in, a full three seconds of some dog biting her on either side. Murphy snaked an arm around her shoulders, but as the sensation eased she steadied herself and he tentatively moved aside.
“Guests, boss,” one of the gunmen outside called.
The one called Tony, Alicia thought.
Tony hustled Janine Paulson and a disarmed and de-vested officer inside.
Paulson said, “I’m authorised to offer you—”
“Why can’t I just talk?” Faulkner demanded. “Interruptions, interruptions. Next person to speak dies first.”
“First?” It was the Moss Side chap. “If we’re all going to die anyway, what’s the point in kowtowing to you?”
Faulkner aimed again at the man.
The first fella to interrupt, the polo-shirt-and-chinos guy, lowered his hands too. “He’s right. There are two here, one up top. Three outside.”
Slater trained his weapon on the chinos guy. “Shut UP!”
But he addressed his fellow captives. “If we stand here like cattle, we all die. For certain. If we all move at once, only a few of us die.”
His words rippled through the gathering. Men and women lowering hands from their heads. Chests out. Chins jutting, some evolutionary hangover to demonstrate physical prowess dominant in humans, apes, monkeys, even chinchillas.
Fists clenched.
Vernon Slater stepped back, flicking a switch on his gun, presumably setting it to full auto.
“Stand firm,” Faulkner ordered.
“We are,” Moss Side said. “We’re not afraid of you.”
As the majority of the galvanised hostages split themselves automatically in two—half facing Vernon, half Faulkner—Alicia spotted a similar development outside, and for the first time, the steel in Faulkner’s manner wavered.
He said, “Fine, no more speeches. Time to end this. Aim!”
Alicia doubled over, and staggered to a chair, this time faking it as she cried out.
“Pull the other one,” Faulkner said.
Paulson and Murphy tended to Alicia, who pushed them away as a genuine double-pain stabbed at her. She grunted as she tried to talk.
“Your men won’t obey,” she said.
“They will. Time to end this.”
“Because you’re a liar, Norman.” She fixed on Lamar, who met her gaze. “You’re right.” She struggled to her feet. “Like you said, it’s time to end this.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
“Okay, bear with me, this is complicated,” Alicia said. “He’s played you all from the start. Took your fears and amplified them.”
“She’s messing with you,” Faulkner insisted. “Don’t listen.”
“Norman is real.” Alicia thought of what she was doing as pacing to keep the focus on her, but it was more of a hobble. The intermittent cramps hit her back now, spreading from the sides. “The fake persona is Kireyev Anatoliy Ilyich. In the olden days, his original spree, he took on the same fake ID as the real Tolya. Perhaps Norman was affiliated with a domestic agency?”
A flicker of surprise sparked in Norman’s eyes.
“Yes, very good. MI5 in the eighties. So he knew who used hookers. Picked them up and tortured them to make it look like he’d squeezed intel from them, but actually learned nothing. Didn’t care. Just loved the violence. Tried to pin it on a Russian spy.
“To avoid embarrassment, your old bosses convinced their higher-ups to go with it.
“But some deeper digging from our expert research duo tells us the real Ilyich died ten years ago in St. Petersburg. At least someone of that name did. Not sure who he was, but he did something to warrant a state funeral. So I’m guessing he was the real spy.
“You, Norman Faulkner, you’re a sick puppy who loves to observe as things play out. You get a kick from seeing violence, from watching chaos. This past week, it’s why you added in the flavour of the protests, pitting opposites against one another. Not necessary but you needed it, the kick. Manipulating others to violence so you can watch it unfold. Your doing. Your chaos. Back then, though, the hookers, the fake Russian spy business, it was classic double agent double bluffing. You wanted to manipulate the government, make them afraid, and force them to act. Because what would be the ultimate thrill to a fantasist and chaos freak?”
Vernon Slater firmed up his grip, sweat no doubt making his weapon a little slick to hold.
Alicia said, “A nuclear war. Right? Now nukes are less likely, but a Russian nationalist terror attack at the heart of Britain’s masters of the universe … may be enough to sour our relations, for Russia to take offence at such accusations. Maybe even, in your fantasy, provoke a wider conflict.”
Faulkner said nothing.
“That’s not true,” Lamar said. “It is, boss? We’re making things better here.”
Faulkner glanced up at him, then at Slater, whose own expression asked the same question.
“Well, Norman?” Alicia said. “How about it? You’re a voyeur aren’t you? You love the notion that you can persuade these people to do your bidding. Sheep. Be it kicking up a Twitterstorm or taking up arms against those who represent the polar opposite of their own self-worth. And to drum up the maximum impact, you needed us—the police—to resurrect that old identity. Kireyev Anatoliy Ilyich. Tolya the Spy. It’s almost as good a nickname as The Magician. Hey, what’s with the magic, anyway? Trademark?”
Faulkner’s tone turned cautious, as if she was tricking him. “Just a hobby. Is that what you call me? The Magician?”
“No. It’s Norman. One of the dullest names in the world.” Alicia addressed the Facebook Live woman’s phone. “Sorry to all the Normans out there. I’m sure you’re all lovely, interesting people, but you know your name is rubbish.”
“Umm…” Paulson made a light cough.
“Sure, sorry.” Back to Norman Faulkner. “You needed us to resurrect that ID, so when you make your big reveal—this little army of anarchists talking communism, threatening that the old communist threat is lurking beneath modern Russia’s capitalist shell … your hope is to push the simmering tensions over the edge. Make out like this was state-sanctioned. This is your goal. Not punishing the people who crushed the hopes of your followers, but a sick, twisted desire to see death and destruction on the biggest scale possible. War.”
“You’re lying,” Slater said, but his voice pitched too high.
“And I think Norman is such a narcissist that he wants everyone to know how clever he is. Because some clichés are rooted in truth. What’s the biggest cliché in serial killer lore?” When no one answered, she said, “That they want to be caught. They want to stop. But really, they don’t. They want to be famous. In their warped minds, they are the centre of the universe. They know the secrets to life. They know that their right to kill is paramount, even if society deems it ‘evil’. And they want everyone to know it. It’s why they sometimes communicate with the police or the press, leave clues here and there. Sometimes they come up with implausibly complicated plans, which sometimes come off and sometimes do not. And that’s what you are, my toothy little Normy. A serial killer with thirty years to plan his next manifesto, to work out the best way to push the powers-that-be over the edge. Want to tell the world what that is?”
“Fear,” Norman said. “Fear of death, but more than that. Fear of defeat. Without these people, without their money, governments fall.”
“And the murder of sixty-odd people here would force them to act,” Alicia said. “But an individual who surrenders to the police wouldn’t be enough. Lone wolves don’t inspire war. When a prisoner eventually confesses all … because we hauled you in earlier and
we put Tolya the Spy on the record … so Tolya the Spy makes the confession. Not Norman.”
Faulkner chuckled a little. “Damn it, you are clever. Thing is, my motives don’t make a jot a’ difference. It’s their motives that matter right now. And it’s their motives—punishing the bastards who destroyed their lives before they were even born—that’s what’ll end this. And you too, since you got so clever.” To his acolytes, Faulkner raised a fist. “Open fire!”
Paulson cringed while Murphy flinched. Alicia stood by. Having seen the tension ease out of both Vernon Slater and Lamar Reynolds, she held no doubt that she’d done enough. Because no gunfire erupted outside, she figured it’d reached Misters Black, Potter, and Vincent too.
“You’re a leader, Norman,” Alicia said. “You dig deep inside a troubled mind and instil a sense of purpose in them. A way to master their fears, to grow the courage to change. That’s both an incredible skill, and your mistake. Because while you’re on top, with everything going to plan, they’ll follow you through volcanoes and ice fields, but when you go into decline … boy, that’s a steep drop off.”
“Fire,” Norman ordered. “Kill them all!”
“Yeah, you understand now. When you implant yourself so firmly inside a person’s self-worth, when it’s you, and your lessons and goals that fuel their courage … when they lose faith in you, they lose that courage.” Alicia winked at Paulson. “Not dissing my speeches now, are you?”
Norman glared at Alicia, whipped his gun up.
Paulson yelled, “No!” and charged into Alicia.
A gun fired. Two of them. Impossibly-loud rattles in the enclosed space.
Everyone ducked. Some dived to the floor.
Alicia hit the deck under Paulson’s momentum, the impact rippling through her whole body.
Nothing and no one moved for a long time.
The first thing to move was the child inside Alicia. Or rather, the walls of her uterus did. As fluid gushed from between her legs, she cried out at the pain, yet through that fog of misery, she desperately checked Paulson, looking for wounds or blood. Even the chief super seemed surprised she was hole-free, patting herself down, desperately seeking out the injury. When it didn’t come, when Murphy knelt beside them and said, “It’s okay. It’s over.”
Only then did the two women scan the room for Faulkner.
He lay slumped against the wall, machine-gun in-hand and a hole in his forehead, the back missing and his brains spread over the oak wall. His chest was a mush of red and torn cloth.
Both Vernon Slater and Lamar Reynolds were frozen in perfect shooting stances, guns smoking. One made the head-shot, the other the chest.
Both tried to save her life.
And Paulson, too.
When she could talk again, Alicia would have to thank her. For now, though, she let out a huge wail as the lower half of her body tried to explode.
CHAPTER FORTY
Somewhat unbelievably, in a room full of millionaires and billionaires there was not a single midwife or paediatrician. As Paulson demanded medical help, a pair of plastic surgeons and three doctors with various specialisms raised their hands to volunteer, but Paulson wasn’t convinced this was the best way forward.
After Vernon Slater and Lamar Reynolds surrendered their weapons and knelt on the floor, the three outside followed suit, and once she and Murphy mollified the hostages enough to dissuade them from meting out their own revenge, they placed the surviving gunmen under arrest, and yelled for her men to breach.
They’d been waiting for the order on the outskirts of the house, and without instructions to the contrary, they blew the windows and piled in ready for lethal force. Finding the enemy already beaten, waiting to be taken away, eased the CTC tactical officers’ manner immeasurably, and to do away with the demands for justice and immediate questions of how could this have happened, Commissioner Rhapshaw instructed the men and women that their children were waiting for them in the main building. This evacuated the place in record time, while Rhapshaw and Nixon made the arrests personally, and would look splendid leading them to the waiting police vehicles. It left Murphy kneeling on the ground, Alicia propped up on him as if he were a giant pillow, and Paulson pulling down Alicia’s sodden maternity leggings and knickers.
A far more intimate eyeful than she’d ever gotten from someone under her command.
The only two people who did not race out were two of the doctors. Neither had delivered a baby in the past ten years, but there were infinitely more qualified than the two cops. While one of the doctors phoned a hospital to prepare a bed, the other kept an eye on Alicia, on her dilation, and Paulson took one of her hands, Murphy the other.
“Not wide enough,” the doctor said. “Do not push yet.”
“I have to!” Alicia screamed.
“If you do, you risk harming yourself and the baby. Do not push.”
“I’m pushing!”
“Alicia,” Paulson said. “Don’t you dare push.”
Tears streamed down PC Pixie’s face. “I have to. I’m going to.”
“What I’ve seen this week from you, it’s infuriating. It goes against everything I’ve ever known as a senior officer in this Service. But without you, we would not have solved it. We wouldn’t have saved these people. And okay, I doubt very much that maniac would have pushed us to war, but we still saved these people. With your stupid overblown speech.”
Alicia guffed out a single laugh. “Stop it. Let me push.”
“Alicia, you showed some guts here. You nearly set off a bomb, which I should discipline you for, and still might. You faced down a bloody psycho with more identities than Doctor bloody Who. Now you’re telling me you can’t resist pushing? Forget it. You’re holding on here.”
“O … okay. I’ll try…”
“DS Friend, I am going to be in so much trouble for tonight. You will do more than try.”
“You?” Alicia grunted, another scream suppressed. “Why … you?”
“I have a duty of care to my people. You might not believe it, but I’m the one responsible for letting you in here. You’re on leave, and I’m forbidden from letting you work, even if you insist.”
“You’ll ride it out.”
“You will,” Murphy said. “No one dead except the bad guy. It’s a result. Ton of paperwork, long public inquiry but—”
Alicia made a noise like “Nnnngggggggg” and her face turned so red it looked ready to pop. She gripped Paulson’s hand much harder than a girl that size should have been able.
“When you come back,” Paulson said, “it’s a clean slate. Okay?”
“If … you don’t … merge us … with—”
“Even if we do merge…” Paulson resisted a scream of her own as Alicia dug her nails in. When the grip eased, she said, “If we merge, I’ll keep your seat warm. On one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“You don’t bloody push.”
As Alicia blurted another half-laugh, a pair of paramedics rushed in and took over from the doctor who told them, “Four centimetres. She’s not ready yet,” like she was a cake or something.
The rest of it went by in a blur. Having prioritised an early labour over treatment for shock, they stretchered her to an ambulance where they could take care of her more ably. Alicia insisted on her two squeeze toys coming along, and although Paulson knew she should be coordinating things up at the school, she left that honour to Rhapshaw and Nixon.
“We might make it to the hospital,” one of the paramedics said.
“Do it!” Alicia squawked.
And they did. They rushed her there, and Murphy placed a call to Alicia’s mum and someone called Roberta. Paulson hadn’t realised Alicia was gay, but with Stevenson inviting her to his wedding, she stopped finding such families odd a long time ago. Roberta wouldn’t make it in time, though, so Paulson stuck around. She didn’t have to—even Alicia said she could go now, clinging instead to Murphy—but having made it as far as the hospital entran
ce, there was no way she was leaving now.
Two hours later, of pacing the ward corridor, of fielding phone calls from colleagues who’d heard of Alicia’s situation, and from Commissioner Rhapshaw himself, Paulson was called in to the maternity suite to find Alicia cradling a little pink human wrapped in a towel, and Murphy wiping tears from his cheek. A warmth swelled within Paulson and pressure built behind her eyes, and she couldn’t help but let a tear or two of her own escape.
“It’s a girl,” Alicia said, red in the face. “First time for everything, Robbie.”
SEVERAL DAYS LATER
ALICIA IS UNSURE EXACTLY WHICH DAY
THEY ALL MERGE INTO ONE
AFTER A WHILE WITH A NEW BABY
EPILOGUE
In the weeks since her breakdown and drunken rant, Katie has returned to therapy, upped her sessions, accepted the pills she previously refused to take, and for the first time in months she believes she has a future. She hit the gym, cut out alcohol and chocolate, and already her jeans fit more comfortably and climbing stairs is less of a chore. She applied to take up her studies again, start the year over in September, and even found herself a job at a coffee shop. Not that she needs the money, but she does need to feel human again. And it is all thanks to Alicia Friend.
She gave Katie the wakeup call, pushed her back to her therapist, and her words hit some button that had previously been missed.
Katie has dropped by the hospital to discuss with the doctors what would happen if she no longer wishes to prolong her father’s life using machines. If she decides to withdraw funding, take out the assisted breathing, and see how he fares on his own.
That’s the reason she’s here today. And the consultant explained it already, that she needs to take some time. So she came here, to see her dad, to figure out how she felt when she saw him in the flesh.
