Council of Peacocks (5 page)

“
Yes I did.” He put his hand on his
friend’s shoulder. “I saw what they did to you last night. It’s
wrong and it’s weird but they’re not coming back. Monsters always
go away when someone else sees them. It’s a rule.”

“
Maybe.” Tommy set the cup down then
looked away. “I still know I’m going to die.”

***

‘And he did,’ Josh thought. ‘In the hospital
a few days after those things in the woods beat him up. Those
things with wings. And I’d seen them before. How could I forget
something like this?’

The two voices screamed again.

One of them cut off suddenly.

‘Like a tape had been stopped. Or a throat
had been cut. I could really use a miracle right about now. I know
two in one day is pushing it, but please!’

The chain fell from where it was anchored to
the ceiling and landed on the floor with a loud clang.

Josh panted, quick shallow breaths. He felt
light-headed, his heart racing.

When the echoes ended, the only sound he
heard was the pounding of his heart. He stared at the door,
expecting it to open any second. They had to have heard that.

The door did not open. They weren’t
coming.

‘Maybe they didn’t hear. Even if they did,
there’s no way they would equate that sound with me pulling the
chains out of the ceiling. It’s impossible. A…’

***

“
A miracle. That’s what it is. It’s a
bloody miracle you weren’t killed.”

His mother, crying, held him against her
chest, tightly, and kissed a cut on his forehead.

Josh was six years old. His body was covered
in scrapes. His head felt funny and he could not feel his left
arm.

“
It’s nothing,” he said.

“
Nothing? You were hit by a bus! Your body
flew into that tree.”

“
Leave the boy alone, Therese.” His father
spoke from the doorway. He was dressed in a dark suit and
sunglasses, like he was heading to a funeral. “Get him to the
hospital. I’ll take care of the police here. And that driver. I
will definitely take care of him.”

***

Josh pushed the memory away. ‘Focus. That has
nothing to do with this situation. I’m just lucky. Things just work
out for me.’ He looked around the room and laughed. ‘Yeah. Things
work out for me really well.’

A voice he recognized as intuition told him
he couldn’t risk the second chain falling. He’d been lucky once. He
didn’t want to push the luck he had left. As quickly as he dared,
he lifted his right hand. The chain rose with it, a harsh metallic
sound trickling through the room each time a link moved across
concrete.

By the time his right hand was halfway up, he
started to feel the strain. Each link was two inches of thick
steel. It was heavy and, after two car crashes, his body was
fatigued. Moving quickly would lessen the strain but increase the
noise. If his captors caught him with one arm free, they would kill
him immediately.

When his hand reached the manacle, he
searched for clasps. Finding it locked, he searched the seams for a
weak point.

‘If I can pull the metal chain out of the
ceiling, I should be able to snap this right off.’ Only problem, he
had no idea how he’d done that. All he did was pull and ask
for…

***

“
A miracle.”

He looked down at Tommy Delonki. Once his
best friend, he was now just a frail 16-year-old lying in the dirt.
His body was battered almost beyond recognition. Tears smudged the
blood and dirt on his cheeks.

“
It’s nothing.” Josh, crying, held Tommy’s
hand.

“
Nothing?” Tommy coughed. A trickle of
blood dripped down his lips. “You took on those things. You beat
them and you’ve barely got a scratch. You did that all for me? I
guess we’re still friends after all.”

Josh looked over his shoulder.

Bodies burned behind him, scaly flesh now
blackened and charred.

“
They’re called Edimmu,” Josh said. He
looked back at Tommy and squeezed his hand. Tommy blinked, the
movement slow like a snowflake falling from the sky.

“
How do you know that? I’ve never told
you.”

Josh swallowed and looked down at his
hands.

“
I don’t….”

***

“…know.”

Josh froze. ‘What the hell is an Edimmu? It
had to be those winged things but Tommy was right. There’s no way I
could know that. Just like I couldn’t pull a chain out of the
ceiling. Or survive getting hit by a bus at six. There’s no way I
could…’

The manacles on his both hands clicked open.
The left swung away while the right fell with a thud at his
feet.

“Impossible.”

He looked around the room hoping to find his
clothes. There was nothing in the room except him, the light bulbs
and the chains.

And the door.

Then, Jan screamed again.

‘Analyze later,’ he thought. He walked to the
door, assuming it would be locked. Still, when he turned the
doorknob, he felt a stab of disappointment when it didn’t move.
‘Guess I’ve run out of miracles.’

‘Damn.’ He stepped back and studied the door.
‘I’ve got to get them away from her. No idea how many there are or
how they’re armed. Dad taught me to run from this sort of thing. He
said not to worry about him or Mom, just get myself out of the
situation. I always told him I understood. On some level I guess I
convinced myself I could be the stone-cold survivor. But I can’t
leave her. I couldn’t live with myself. This door’s only going to
open from the other side. Guess I know what I have to do.’

He lifted a length of chain. He swung it
above his head several times, gathering momentum. When it built up
enough speed to create a humming sound, he threw the chain.

It slammed into the door.

The solid metal door didn’t break but that
wasn’t his intention.

All he wanted was to get their attention.

He wiped sweat from his nose and walked back
to the door. He put his ear against the cold metal and heard
nothing.

The screams had stopped.

He picked up the chain and listened again. He
heard a faint, repeating sound, like the tick of a clock.

Or footsteps.

‘Wish I could remember how I killed those
winged things. The Edimmu. Guess I’ll have to rely on what Dad
taught me.’

He covered his mouth, terrified for a moment.
Then he stretched his arms and shoulders. He had to relax if he was
going to do this. Mouth dry, he picked up the chain again. He threw
it above him and it shattered into the nearest light bulb. He
turned his head as glass showered down on him. When he looked back,
the room was darker than he expected. With luck, it would make the
fight more equal.

He shattered the other light and the room
went pitch black. Josh closed his eyes to fight disorientation. He
walked, arms outstretched, to the door. When he opened his eyes, he
was surprised to see a crack of light under the door.

‘Hinges open outward. Can’t hide behind the
door. I’ll have to stand in their blind spot and hope for the
best.’

He pressed his body up against the wall two
feet to the right of the doorframe.

He waited.

With a loud slam the window opened. A square
of light lit up the back wall. Josh held his breath.

“Lookee here, Simon. This bloke wants to have
a go.”

‘Australian?’ Josh thought. ‘I’d expect a
French accent this deep in Quebec. These boys aren’t local.’

Josh heard two clicks. His father had trained
him to recognize the sounds: guns being cocked. That was all he
needed to know.

He heard keys jingle and, after a series of
metallic clicks, the door unlocked. It opened slowly. The darkness
dissipated into murky gray. Josh saw the silhouettes of two men
against the back wall. The one in front was slightly shorter than
the one behind. Their bodies cut off most of the light. Josh had
only a few seconds before they saw him.

He sprung.

With his left hand he grabbed the wrist of
the front man’s gun hand. He held it out to the side and, in the
same movement, punched with all his strength at his throat. His
target’s face went red even as his fingers twitched on the trigger.
A bullet shot into the back wall. Josh grabbed the man’s head,
pushed it down and smashed his knee into the man’s face. His body
went limp. Josh threw him backwards into the second man.
Instinctively, the bigger man’s hands went around his friend,
trying to break his fall. Josh tensed the index and middle fingers
of his right hand and stabbed them straight through the second
man’s left eye. When he took his hand back it was covered in red
and white goo. The second man screamed, hands rushing to cover his
wound. Josh stepped on the wrist of the first man’s gun hand. He
put his weight on it until the man let the gun go.

Josh picked up the pistol and shot both men
in the head.

The echoes hung in the air for a long
time.

‘That was too easy,’ he whispered.
‘Seriously. How did I do that? I’ve only fired guns at the firing
range. Dad said if I was fighting for my life I had to be willing
to kill. He said when the time came it was just about death, yours
or the other person’s. Still, shouldn’t I be more freaked out? I
killed these guys and I feel nothing.’

He stared at the gun in his hand. A moment
later he bent down to retrieve the second man’s gun. It was the
first time he really looked at his captors.

The shorter man was a slightly balding
redhead. The one in back bore an uncanny resemblance to a young
Robert Redford. Both wore white surgical gowns over dark
clothing.

‘Not what I was expecting,’ he thought.
‘Maybe Rebecca was right. Maybe this isn’t random at all. Maybe we
are hostages. But if they’re after my Dad, why weren’t they
questioning me? Dad said they would shoot a video with me to prove
I was still alive. Who are these people?’

He stepped over the bodies into the hallway.
The door to his cell was one of many that lined both sides of the
corridor.

‘So many doors,’ he thought. ‘I could shout
out for Jan, try to find out where she is. Stupid. That would give
me away. I’ll just have to check the doors one by one.’

Josh stopped in front of the next door and
cautiously opened the window. Inside was a young woman in a torn
blue dress. She hung from the ceiling just as like he had.
Intravenous tubes pumped black and green fluids into her body.
Strange symbols were drawn in blood down her arms.

‘Who are these people?’ He shook his head and
closed the window. ‘Questions for later. I have to find Jan and get
out of here.’

The next door on the right was open. It led
to a brightly lit room with three operating tables equally spaced
around the room. One bed was empty. Jan was in the second. His eyes
froze on the third.

“Brian.”

Josh ignored Jan’s pleas and stood over his
friend’s body. His legs had been removed. On a nearby metal tray
sat a surgical saw with pieces of flesh embedded in the teeth of
the blade. Brian’s face was stiff, open mouth frozen in a scream
that would last forever.

“Josh, you’ve got to snap out of it,” Jan
said. “Help me.” It wasn’t the words that got to him; it was the
surprisingly calm tone. He forced himself to turn away from Brian
and untied the straps that bound her to the table. She wore a blue
dress identical to the one he’d seen on the other woman. The same
strange symbols were drawn in blood down her arms.

“Are you okay?” He asked. “What were they
doing to you?’

“I don’t know.” Jan slipped off the table.
“They said I was a candidate. Kept muttering something about
Eyeness and Activation. Who cares? They’re crazy people. I’ve seen
at least five of them. They come in shifts. Two left a little while
ago.”

“It’s okay. I killed them.”

Jan’s eyes went wide and she took a step back
from Josh.

Josh passed her one of the guns. “Take this.
I know how much you hate guns. Don’t worry about being accurate. If
you see someone coming you don’t recognize, point and shoot. Have
you seen the others? Rebecca or Matt?

“No.” Jan glanced briefly at Brian’s body.
She turned away and folded her arms over her chest. “They made me
watch. Wanted to see if it triggered something.”

“Damn.” Josh swallowed down tears and stared
at the ceiling. “We need to focus if we want to get out of this.
Stay close and watch my back. Okay?”

Jan nodded. She grabbed the gun with both
hands and followed Josh back into the hallway.

Chapter Five

“We need to find a phone,” Jan whispered.

“No, we don’t.” Josh looked up and down the
hallway, trying to think.

“Josh, we have to get help.”

He turned and placed the palm of his hand
against her cheek. “Jan. I love you. Trust me.”

Now that Jan was safe, he realized he’d made
a tactical error. He led them back to his cell and searched the
bodies of the men he had killed. He found a set of keys and cursed
under his breath.

“What’s the matter?” Jan very deliberately
kept her eyes off the dead bodies.

“There are a lot of keys on here. I’ve no
idea which one opens what.” He stood. “Here’s the plan. We’ll go up
and down this hallway. There are doors on each side. I’ll open the
window on one side, you open the other. If you don’t recognize the
person, close the window.”

“We’ve got to help them…”

“No, we don’t. Look, by rights we should just
get out of here and leave everyone behind.”

“By rights?” Jan narrowed her eyebrows. “Is
that what your secret agent father would do? Would he even save me?
Or would he leave me to die?”

Josh looked at her and said nothing.

“I see. Well, whatever you think, you’re not
your father.”

Josh walked away from her. She followed and
grabbed his arm.