Lights Out

by Amy Cross

  Cassie immediately runs at the man, while pulling a dagger from her belt, but armed guards jump down from the truck and hold her back.

  “I'm glad to have the three of you all here together, though,” Michael Essien continues. “Anders Holl. Cassandra Tolman. Tom Dansing. I think we need to -”

  Suddenly Cassie bursts free again, rushing at Essien. Standing calm and still, Essien doesn't even flinch as Cassie reaches him, and then he watches with satisfaction as she's brought crashing to the ground. He looks down, just in time to see one of his guards slamming an elbow against the back of her head.

  “As I was saying,” Essien adds finally, before turning to the others, “I think we need to talk. Don't you?”

  Chapter TwentyFive

  Ten years ago

  “We have to kill ourselves,” Cassie whispers, as she stumbles across the desert with Anders on one side and Tom on the other. “We have to make sure we don't reveal anything.”

  “Don't jump the gun just yet,” Anders replies. “There's still -”

  “Move!” one of the guards yells, poking him hard in the back with a rifle. “And keep your hands behind your head!”

  Anders does as he's told.

  “There's still time to get out of this,” he continues, as his eyes fix on the tent ahead where Essien is already taking some shade. “Have a little patience.”

  “You've heard the stories,” Cassie replies. “Everyone knows what Essien does to his prisoners. He gets information out of them, and then he kills them in the most brutal ways he can imagine. The man's a psychopath. They say he can force anyone to talk. They say his interrogation methods are the most horrific in the world. Standard procedure in these situations is to die.” She turns to Tom, whose face is bloodied and bruised already. “You didn't tell him anything, did you?”

  “Of course not,” he spits back at her. “What kind of man do you think I am?”

  “Stop here!” one of the guards says, and the three prisoners come to a halt just a few feet from the tent.

  “The most important thing is that we don't compromise any of the other ongoing missions,” Cassie continues. “Remember your training.”

  “I'm the one who trained you!” Anders points out.

  Cassie opens her mouth to reply, but then she spots Essien emerging from the tent. She watches as he talks to one of his associates, and she feels a shiver pass up her spine as he turns and makes eye contact with her. Flinching, she has to hold herself back from rushing at him for a third time. She tells herself that another chance will come. If she can kill Essien, she considers that to be worth paying the ultimate price.

  “I'm sorry you had to walk here,” Essien says, as he wanders over to face the three prisoners, “while I drove ahead, but I hope you understand that my time is precious. Besides, I would imagine that you had time to think about how we're going to deal with one another. I won't patronize you by pretending that I've brought you here to be my friends. You know who I am, I know who you are, and all that remains is for us to come to some kind of compromise.”

  He smiles, waiting for one of the prisoners to say something, but they all simply stare at him.

  “You're not upset about my little trap, are you?” he asks finally. “As I was saying earlier to Mr. Dansing, after I apprehended him with his team, life is all about traps. We're all constantly negotiating traps, sometimes even traps that we inadvertently set for ourselves. All through our lives, we -”

  “I heard this Essien guy was pretentious,” Anders says suddenly, cutting him off, “but I didn't realize he was also such a fucking prick.”

  Essien's eyes narrow slightly, but the smile remains on his face.

  “I interviewed one of your friends once,” Anders tells him. “It was more of an interrogation, really. Anyway, I asked him a lot of questions, and eventually he broke. I asked him what you're like in person, and he told me that you're always trying to be poetic and insightful. He said it's a really pathetic thing.” He pauses, waiting for Essien's anger to explode. “He said he and his fellow criminals always had to sit around,” he adds, “listening to your boring speeches. Apparently they all thought you were thick as shit.”

  Essien stares at him for a moment, and then his smile broadens.

  “I like you,” he announces. “You're trying to piss me off, so that I'll beat you. Maybe you even want me to kill you. That shows a kind of strength.”

  “Fuck you!” Anders spits.

  Essien immediately bursts out laughing, before taking a step to one side and staring at Cassie.

  “And you're quite pretty,” he says, tilting his head slightly, “in a rough, sweaty kind of way. I suppose you think I'm some kind of pig. You're paid well for your work, Ms. Tolman, I'm sure of that. But do you also get a little sense of moral superiority out of it all? I'll tell you one thing, though. I might be a gun-runner, I might sell arms to some of the cruelest people in the world, but I'm not as bad as the people you work with. Your employers are all murderers and pederasts, Ms. Tolman, albeit they dress in suits and ties and pretend to be respectable. The late, lamented James Wisden used to tell me stories about the people who wield real power in London. I've never been so disgusted in all my life.”

  He waits for her to respond, but she merely continues to stare at him.

  “Cute,” he says, before taking a step closer. “If I might ask, why -”

  Suddenly she spits in his face.

  He turns to one side, and for a moment his calm expression seems set to fall away. He hesitates, and then he turns back to her.

  “Some lubrication for our conversation,” he says with a fresh smile. “How considerate and -”

  Before he can finish, she spits again, this time catching him in the eye. He turns and wipes the spit away, and then he turns to her once more.

  “Do that again,” he says firmly. “I dare you. Do it one more time, and I'll make you regret it.”

  He stares at her.

  After a moment, she spits for a third time.

  “Not much saliva left, huh?” he says, as he wipes the meager dribble from his cheek. “I'm not surprised, in these hot conditions. But you did take me up on my dare, so I shall have to make you regret your actions. First, though, I have a little unfinished business to complete from earlier. Did you know, I captured your friend Tom Dansing earlier and he wouldn't talk to me? He wouldn't give me any information at all. I was quite impressed by him, as well.”

  “You're a murderer!” she says through gritted teeth. “You have the blood of thousands on your hands. Maybe even millions.”

  “I know,” he replies.

  “You're an example of everything that's wrong with the human race!”

  “I know.”

  “You disgust me.”

  “I know.”

  “You...”

  She pauses, as if she can't quite summon the right words.

  “Your friend Mr. Dansing would not dance for me,” Essien continues. “Frankly, I doubt he has much of value. He's something of a dogsbody, a grunter, and do you know what that means? It means he is of no further use. So what do I do with a man for whom I have no use? Do I continue to feed him? Do I set him loose? Do I sell him on?” He turns and looks over at Tom. “Or do I at least try to gain something from the encounter?”

  “Fuck you!” Tom hisses. “You're no more than a -”

  Before he can finish, two men puts their hands on his shoulders from behind and force him down onto his knees.

  “You're no more than vermin!” Tom says firmly, as Essien makes his way over to him. “Do you think you can keep running forever? Men like you always end up on the wrong side of history. The walls are closing in, Essien. How can you even live with that constant sense of dread? You must know that, at any moment, your world's going to collapse.”

  Ignoring him, Essien walks to one of his associates, who hands him a long, curved sword.

  “Do you really think we're alone?” Tom asks him, as Essien stops next to him and
raises the sword. “They're coming for you, Essien. All your enemies are going to find you!”

  “Bow your head.”

  “They know all about you in London. Do you think they'll just let you walk away with all your blood money?”

  “I know their secrets,” he replies, as the sword's edge glints in the desert sun. “Secrets are the currency of the world. Now bow your head.”

  “Go fuck yourself!”

  “Don't hurt him!” Cassie stammers, as she tries not to panic. “Do you hear me, Essien? Leave him alone!”

  Essien grins.

  “Be quiet!” Anders hisses to her. “You'll only encourage him!”

  “If you want to hurt someone,” she continues, “why don't you hurt me? I'm the one who spat in your face!”

  “It's okay,” Tom says, turning to her. “Cassie, you're going to get out of this.”

  “We're all going to get out of this,” she tells him. “Tom, I'm not -”

  Suddenly Essien screams and brings the sword slicing down. Cassie screams too, but Tom Dansing merely flinches and lets out a guttural gasp as the blade hacks into the back of his neck and runs almost straight through to the front of his throat.

  Essien has to pull twice to get the sword out.

  Tom slumps forward onto his hands and knees. Cassie is still screaming, still trying to get over and help, as blood sprays from the back of Tom's neck and starts sinking into the sun-baked sand.

  Essien adjusts his position and his grip on the sword, and then he drives it down again. He misses the original wound and instead carves a second, a little shallower this time but with enough force to send Tom crashing down face-first against the desert floor.

  Grunting, Essien slides the bloodied blade out of the wound and raises it again.

  “Stop!” Cassie screams.

  Tom starts to sit up and kneel, just at the moment that Essien strikes again. This time the sword goes almost straight into the first wound and slices down before ripping out through the front. Another faint gasp leaves Tom's lips, and then his head topples forward and falls down against the ground.

  Essien pulls the blade back, leaving Tom's decapitated body kneeling with blood spraying from the bloodied neck.

  On the ground, Tom's eyes twitch slightly before falling still, and then Essien steps over and uses his right foot to turn the head around so that he can see the face.

  Anders is looking away, trembling slightly as he tries to ignore everything that just happened.

  Cassie stumbles and drops to her knees, shaking violently as she stares in horror at the bloody scene. And in that moment, her heart breaks forever.

  Chapter TwentySix

  Ten years ago

  “Get inside,” Essien mutters as he shoves Cassie hard in the small of the back, sending her stumbling into the main tent. “You're starting to burn in the sun.”

  Stopping, Cassie stares ahead into the darkness, but she's not actually seeing the tent's shabby interior. Instead, in her mind's eye she's replaying Tom's final moments over and over, and she's hearing the sickening thud of the blade every time it hacked deeper into his neck. As those images and sounds cross her thoughts, the left side of her face is starting to twitch slightly. She's out of control, and she can feel the rage building and building in her body and mind.

  “I did him a favor,” Essien says, watching her from behind. “Anyone else in my position would have been -”

  Suddenly a scream rings out from beyond the tent.

  “Your friend is putting up good resistance,” Essien continues. “I'm sure Mr. Holl will talk eventually. He must have some interesting secrets.”

  He waits, but Cassie remains standing a few feet away. Her hands are restrained by ropes behind her back, but she's gently pulling her wrists as she tests for a way to get free.

  “I'm not going to kill you, you know,” Essien explains, as Anders cries out again. “Your friend's death was necessary, but I prefer to send you and Mr. Holl back home as a kind of message. I'm not a barbarian, Ms. Tolman. I find both you and Mr. Holl to be reasonable, respectable people. Your colleague Mr. Dansing, on the other hand, was rather rude to me during his interrogation. Perhaps I overreacted a little, but I dislike rudeness. I also dislike arrogance, and he was a very arrogant man. Tell me, were you and he lovers?”

  Cassie's twitch becomes a little worse. The anger in her mind hasn't yet met the anger in her body. She's trying to bring them together, to unify them as one force that she can then turn against the object of her hatred.

  “There was something between you,” Essien continues, “but I think perhaps it was unspoken. Unfulfilled. Yes, that's what my gut is telling me, and my gut is always right. I'm afraid that, in his rudeness, Mr. Dansing set a trap for himself. He guaranteed his own death.”

  Cassie's breathing is starting to get faster as a sense of pure, unbridled panic begins to spread up through her chest. She's trying harder and harder to get free from the restraints.

  “You will be sent home as a message of my ability to act mercifully,” Essien explains. “I don't want important people in London to think that I'm a monster. After all, sooner or later I shall probably want to go back to Europe. I have many friends there and I sincerely hope that I'll be welcomed with open arms. What I've done is really no more than a blip, and I'll be forgiven in time.”

  Cassie winces as she pulls harder on the restraints. The ropes are starting to cut into her wrists, but she doesn't care about the pain. The two sides of her anger are getting closer, their tips are beginning to touch.

  “I'm a good person,” Essien says, suddenly stepping closer and putting his hands on her shoulders from behind, causing her to flinch again. “Sometimes good people do bad things, and sometimes bad people do good things. Sometimes I can't control myself. Do you know what it's like to be out of control? I've been out of control for years. I have the heart and soul of a poet but the body of an animal, and there's a constant tension between the two. Most of the time, my heart and soul are in charge, but occasionally the animal breaks through. I shouldn't complain too much, though.” He looks at the side of her neck. “It's the animal part that gives me my wonderful instincts,” he continues. “There's nothing wrong with the duality. I just need to -”

  Suddenly she turns and headbutts him, sending him staggering back. Filled with rage, she rushes forward and throws herself against Essien's chest, knocking him to the ground and landing on top of him. She slams her right knee against his throat, but at the last moment he manages to push her aside. Climbing on top of her as she struggles, he forces her shoulders down as a trickle of blood drips from his cut lip.

  “That wasn't very nice!” he snaps. “Aren't you tired of being an angry dog all the time? They've taught you all these tricks, haven't they? How to fight. How to kill. But you're still just a trained dog. A trained bitch.”

  She tries again to push him away, but he's holding her too tightly.

  “Have you ever thought about abandoning your masters?” he asks. “I bet you'd do well, working for someone like me. Go on, break your training. Show me you've got an independent thought in that head of yours.”

  She wriggles for a moment longer, before falling still. Staring up at Essien, she watches him with an expression of pure hatred. After a few seconds, however, that expression begins to fade.

  “You know I'm right,” Essien continues, and he sounds a little breathless now as Anders cries out again in the distance. “In the modern world, it's so easy for all of us to forget some of the basics. And one of the basics is that power always wins. Raw power, properly channeled, always defeats weakness.” He tilts his head slightly. “I'm afraid you've been working for some very weak men.”

  He waits.

  She feels her two angers merge in the middle.

  “Now,” Essien purrs, “perhaps you'd like to -”

  Suddenly she bursts up at him, knocking him out of the way and grunting as she slams him down. At the same time, she finally manages to pull he
r hands free. She grabs his throat and squeezes hard, while straddling his chest and pushing down with all the force she can muster. For a couple of seconds, her sheer chaos is too much for Essien to handle, and his first attempts to get free come to nothing. He reaches up and grabs her wrists, and his eyes fill with shock as – instead of struggling – he relaxes his hands and simply stares up at her for a moment. It's as if he can't quite believe the raw fury that he sees.

  But only for a moment.

  And then, in an even greater burst of brute ferocity, he throws her aside and slams her face against the side of a table, before shoving her down against the dirt and leaning close to her right ear.

  “I'm sending you home, bitch,” he sneers. “Back to your masters, as a message. But first, I think you need a little lesson about what real power feels like. Have you ever felt it before? I mean real, honest, devastating power. Power you can't stop, no matter how hard you try.”

  He pauses, before rolling her onto her back and then pressing one arm against her throat. With his other hand, he reaches down and starts unbuckling his trousers.

  “Animal on animal,” he continues. “It's only natural. Give in to what's natural.”

  A moment later he's on top of her, grunting and forcing his way inside. She tries to fight, but after a few seconds she realizes that he's actually enjoying her struggles. Figuring that she can find a way to kill him once it's over, she tries to block out everything that's happening to her now, although her face betrays a slight flicker of horror with each thrust. Soon, her mind is elsewhere, fantasizing about all the different ways she's going to find to kill Michael Essien as soon as he climbs off. She barely feels what he's doing to her, barely hears his taunts. She barely even hears Anders crying out beyond the tent. Her anger – fused from body and soul – is turning its back to the light and curving its spine, preparing for its next chance to strike.

  All Cassie can think about is revenge.

  Chapter TwentySeven