Blue Dome (The Blue Dome Series) (15 page)

Calix navigated the
complicated patterns of winding streets and narrow pathways, while Bede kept
pace immediately behind her. They had been running solidly for half an hour and
Bede could feel the sweat bubbling up through the pores of his skin, despite
the cold. He was now in a part of the city that was less familiar and he felt
uncomfortably disoriented. He was also keenly aware that every step he took was
a step further away from finding his sister.

“Hey, are we nearly
there?” asked Bede.

Calix glanced over her
shoulder, mid-stride.

“Almost, it’s just around
this corner.”

Bede followed her as she
turned down a further side street and into a large gravel car park. They slowed
to a fast walk. Bede’s gaze tracked across the stones to a wide strip of
asphalt that formed the forecourt of a huge, square, slate-grey factory. At the
front of it, a purple, double door was sandwiched between two bright yellow
industrial skips, piled high with rubbish. To the left of the building, a wide
ramp sloped downwards into it like a tongue. As Bede drew closer he could see a
cluster of trucks parked in a turning bay at the bottom. The place was eerily
quiet.

“What is this?” he said.

“My work,” said Calix, as
if stating the blindingly obvious.

“Your
work
is the
hideout?” said Bede. “Where is everyone?”

“Striking, over pay,”
Calix smiled wryly. “Just my luck I had to come in after all. Let’s go inside.”

As she moved towards the
purple door, Bede faltered.

“Look, don’t think I’m
not grateful, I am, but I’ve got to get going,” he said, running his hand
through his hair and scanning the forecourt for a discreet exit.

“What’s with you?” said
Calix, frowning. “We’ve almost killed ourselves trying to escape, and now you
want to go back out there again?”

“Look, it’s a long
story,” said Bede, “but I don’t really have a choice. My sister’s on the
streets right now and she needs me.”

“She’s younger then?”
said Calix.

Bede nodded. “Yeah, just
turned sixteen.”

Calix shrugged and
smiled. “Fair enough.”

She was just about to
point out the pathway that led to the road at the back of the building when
something stopped her. A siren. It was heart-stoppingly close.

“Shit,” said Bede under
his breath.

“C’mon!” Calix grabbed
his shirt and pulled him behind the nearest skip. There was just enough space
for both of them to crouch down low, as the square, black bonnet of the police
car bounced over a speed bump and into the car park. The vehicle ground to a
halt in the gravel and a thin, dark-haired man stepped out from the driver’s
side. A taller, younger, sandy-haired officer soon joined him in the middle of
the forecourt. From the angry expression on the dark haired man’s face, it
looked as if they’d been arguing.

“That’s your whole
problem, Molloy, you’re a
liberal
,” the dark-haired man spat. “If we had
it your way, the crims would be out on the streets. In fact, it’s beyond me why
you even became a cop. It’s like you’re a bleeding social worker most of the
time.”

Molloy rolled his eyes
covertly. “That’s not what I’m saying, Chief. I just don’t get why everyone
thinks the kid did it. Killing his own father? It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Like I keep trying to
tell you, the criminal mind
doesn’t
make sense,” said the chief.

Bede suddenly felt his
stomach lurch towards his throat. He knew exactly what the police were talking
about. A third voice now entered the conversation.

“Can I help you
officers?”

Calix glanced briefly at
Bede. “That’s Bailey, he’s one of the bosses,” she whispered.

“Yeah, we’re looking for
a couple of kids,” the Chief replied. “We think one of them might work here,
a.” he paused to refer to his notebook, “…Calix Michaels?”

“No way,” said Calix,
mouthing the syllables silently as she exchanged startled glances with Bede.

“Yeah, the name’s vaguely
familiar,” said Bailey. “You won’t find her here today though. Worker’s strike,
they’re all off whingeing about pay.”

“Can you let us know when
she turns up again?” said the chief. “We believe she’s got information about a dangerous
murder suspect.” He shot a glance pointedly at Officer Molloy who, just as
pointedly, ignored him.

Calix spun around to face
Bede, her eyes a mix of fear and confusion. He was suddenly conscious of just
how small and bird-like she felt, huddled up next to him.

“They mean you?” she
whispered. “They think
you
killed your father?”

“I didn’t do it, I swear,”
Bede whispered back.

Calix stared at him for a
couple of seconds, trying to decide whether or not to believe him. She was still
making up her mind when the voices on the forecourt distracted her again.

“Do you mind if we take a
quick look around the grounds?” asked the Chief.

Bailey shrugged nonchalantly.
“Yeah, be my guests.”

“We won’t be long.” The
Chief turned to Officer Molloy. “I’ll take the loading bay, you search out
here.”

The younger officer
nodded quickly, relieved to be having a break from his boss. He began scanning
the forecourt when his eyes snagged on a flicker of movement. It was coming from
behind one of the bright yellow skips. He began walking slowly towards it.

“Get down!” Bede hissed,
realising as soon as he’d said it how stupid it sounded there was no possible
way he or Calix could crouch any lower. The police officer was now just a few
steps away from discovering them.

“Hey, Molloy!” the
Chief’s voice suddenly boomed across the forecourt. “Not there, I meant go
around
the building.”

“Yeah, but Chief I think
I saw something moving up here!” he shouted back.

“Probably cats. We’re
looking for kids, Molloy,
kids
.”

Officer Molloy paused,
squinting at the large metal bins as if willing whatever was lurking inside
them to jump out. Bede held his breath, keeping his eyes fixed on the pitch
black tarmac beneath his feet.

Please go, please, please
just go
, he pleaded inside his head.

Slowly, the officer’s
gaze shifted sideways to the pine trees marking the edges of the grounds. He
took one final, backward glance at the skips, before trudging dejectedly towards
the line of the fence. It wasn’t until his footsteps had become tiny pinpricks
of sound that Bede allowed himself to breathe again.

“He’ll be back, Calix,
we’ve got to move.”

Calix glanced at him
indignantly.

“You’ve got
a lot
of
explaining to do,” she said.

“Okay, but not here.”
Bede nodded towards the double doors. “Are they open?”

“Should be, they always
unlock them if someone’s in.”

Calix peered around the
corner of the skip, checking furtively left and right before crawling towards
the door. The handle gave way easily.

 “Quick, this way,” she
whispered, beckoning Bede to follow her inside. “I know how to get to the main
assembly room without being seen.”

They began inching their
way down the long, narrow corridor into the bowels of the building. After about
fifty metres, the corridor opened up into a mezzanine floor that overlooked a
large workshop below.

“I reckon this is
probably the best place to hide,” said Calix. “It’s a total zoo down there, no
one will ever find us.”

As Bede looked over the
banister, he could see exactly what Calix meant. Hanging from the rafters, and
from every conceivable hook, were thousands of doll parts of various shapes and
sizes, from heads with glass eyes and glazed expressions, to flesh-coloured
arms, legs and torsos.

“Man, this place is
seriously creepy,” said Bede. “It’s like some sort of doll’s horror show.”

“I know, Frankenstein
does plastic,” said Calix. She motioned towards the flight of metal stairs that
led to the ground floor. “C’mon, we can talk once we’re a bit more
camouflaged.”

They made their way
across the floor to the aisles of body parts. Calix chose an aisle and went in
first, while Bede hesitated, fidgeting about at the entrance.

“What are you waiting
for?” she said.

“These rows are pretty
narrow. If we knock over the racks, every man and his Pekingese is going to
come running in here,” said Bede.

“No they won’t,” said
Calix. “Management’s upstairs, they won’t hear a thing.”

Before Bede could reply,
Calix reached out, grabbed his sleeve, and pulled him into the aisle. Taken by
surprise, he thumped straight into her, before stepping back awkwardly.

“Sorry, are you all right?”
he asked.

“Yeah, fine.” Calix
brushed herself down. “It’s not like you
murdered
me,” she said, steering
the conversation back to the one they’d overheard on the forecourt. “Now spill,
what’s this about your father?”

Bede took a deep breath,
before briefly recounting the break-in at the house, and the conversation he’d
had with his stepmother. By the time he’d finished, Calix was wrinkling her
forehead in confusion.

“So is your dad actually…”
She didn’t want to say the next word.

“Dead?” said Bede.

“Yeah,” said Calix
awkwardly, “or just missing?”

“I dunno,” said Bede.

Deep down though, buried
in his central core, he
did
know, even if he couldn’t quite admit it to
himself. Suddenly, unpredictably, Bede began to feel his eyes prickle. He quickly
looked away.

“Hey,” said Calix gently,
reaching for his arm.

Embarrassed, Bede gently
shook her off. “I’m fine,” he said.

Neither of them heard the
door close at the top of the mezzanine floor, or the footsteps descend the
stairs. Nor did they hear the sound of boots, stepping softly across the
assembly room floor. In fact it wasn’t until a tall figure, dressed entirely in
black, cast a dark shadow in the aisle that they realised there was anyone else
in the room.

“Stay where you are,”
said Demarge.

Bede spun around as a
jolt of adrenalin fired in his veins.

“The cops?” whispered
Calix, as she tried to peer around him. Bede shook his head.

“Run, Calix,” he said,
turning back to face Demarge.

“How did you find me?” he
said.

“Your good friend
Shrapnel was extremely useful,” said Demarge. “It was predictable that you’d go
running to him for help sooner or later. So I did what any sensible businessman
would – I paid him a lot of money to let me know the minute you turned up. In
fact, the money you have in your pocket right now may well be mine. Ironic,
isn’t it? Of course, it also helped that your friend,
Troy
, decided to set up a squat in one of my buildings. The police,
bless them, are very sympathetic to landlords in those circumstances.” He
laughed dryly. “Really Bede, this has all been
way
too easy.”

Bede felt a small hand
grab at the back of his shirt, pulling him backwards into a gallop. He turned
and followed Calix down the aisle. They were almost at the end of it when
something brought them to an abrupt halt. Demarge was already waiting for them,
casually inspecting his black-gloved hands. His eyes flicked up the second the
footsteps stopped.

“You can’t escape,” he
said.

Bede shook his head in
disbelief. There was no way of explaining how Demarge had been able to move so
quickly.

“I don’t get it. How…”
Bede’s voice trailed away as Calix began tugging on his shirt again.

“C’mon!” she said.

Bede turned to see her
dive under the lowest shelf of the rack behind him and scurry into the next
aisle.

“Get under!” Calix
screamed.

“So what are you going to
do, Bede?” said Demarge, coolly. “Come quietly, or try to escape like your
friend?”

“What do you want?” said
Bede. “Whatever my father’s done, can’t you just sort it out with him?”

Demarge raised his right
eyebrow, frowning in mock confusion. “Your father? This has nothing to do with
him.”

“Then what
has
it
got to do with?” asked Bede.

“Your sister. I need
her.”

Bede felt his fear begin
to disintegrate, as rage began to boil in the pit of his stomach.

“My sister?” he shouted. “What
do you want with her?

Demarge shrugged casually.
“Just a conversation, nothing more.”

“You leave her alone or…”

“Or what? You’ll be
angry, try to kill me even?” Demarge laughed. “It would be entertaining to see
you try.”

“I’m not going anywhere
with you, freak!” Bede shouted.