Anything but Ordinary (4 page)

Tamar. X

For the moment, he was more puzzled than upset. It was her handwriting all right, but not written in her usual cryptic shorthand, and this was not like her –
any
of it. She
never
ran away from a problem. She confronted it head on (sometimes with disastrous results). Always! And if she
had
decided to leave, and he still could hardly believe it, it really was not like her to leave a
note
. She would have told him face to face … Wouldn’t she?  Or was he wrong? Did he not know her as well as he thought? It
was
her writing; he was sure it was. 

Then suddenly the reality hit him; she was gone. There could be a dozen reasons for the note; it did not matter. The fact was, she was gone – really gone. The note, he now realised, had been written in a style meant to discourage him from looking for her.  The explicit request
not
to look for her for one thing, the promise of return and the last line, meant to convey hope. 

On the other hand, if she
said
she was coming back, then she was. He just had to wait.

He picked up the Athame, never very far away from him, and drove it, suddenly and viciously, through the palm of his hand.

* * *

There was an old-fashioned car travelling down a country lane. There was nothing unusual about this, apart from its occupants. 

The driver, in a chauffeur’s peaked cap and a stained T-shirt bearing the faded legend “Wolves do it doggy style”, was lean, gaunt and rangy and extremely hirsute. He wore his hair long, his beard long and his eyebrows bushy, these last, lowering heavily over sharp yellow eyes. He was hunched over the steering wheel, his paws – sorry hands – gripping tightly and his head thrust forward as he continually swung it from side to side like a wary animal. 

The passenger, seated in the back, was of such exceeding thinness that Denny would have looked like a wrestler by comparison. Wrapped in robes of dull grey from head to foot, it could have been either male or female. Only the barest hint of sharp pointed features were visible. 

Without warning, the back seat passenger let out a sharp giggle, and the driver winced and cowered. He put his foot down and the elderly vehicle protested. It did not help; the passenger, displaying an agility that was clearly not human, leapt abruptly out of its seat and clambered out through the sunroof, flinging the robes away as it did so, revealing a long white sleeveless shift.  Now it looked possibly female due to the long white blond hair that streamed behind the figure now swaying on the roof of the car with incredible balance.  The driver sighed –
any minute now
. 

A face, a beautiful yet androgynous face, appeared upside down in the windscreen; the driver reached for his sunglasses and put them on. A futile gesture. A skinny hand reached through the glass as if it were no more than mist and began clawing at the driver’s face. The hand plucked the glasses away and scratched at the driver’s eyes. It managed to extract an eye and the driver slammed the brakes on throwing the offending passenger several feet into a ditch. 

‘AA’ll paay foor thaat laaterr,’ he sighed, getting out of the car and sauntering with strange loping gait toward the prostrate figure. 

He retrieved his eye from the side of the road and watched as his master picked himself up apparently unhurt and grinning. The figure definitely looked male now.

‘Maake yoour miind uup’ muttered the driver under his breath. But he bowed obsequiously as the figure approached.

‘Fun eh?’ said the person. ‘Oh I
like
it in this place!  Everything’s so … so …
fun
.’

‘Yaass,’ agreed the driver, in tones that suggested that he thought it anything but. 

‘Seems almost a pity really,’ said the other looking around, then added crisply, ‘Come on Fulk, we have work to do.’ He looked at his driver sternly. ‘And if you ever do that again during a test I will personally rip out your entrails and use them for a hat, all right?’

Fulk bowed his head. ‘Yaass maaster,’ he said. He believed him. He still remembered what he had done to the unfortunate customs official when they had arrived off the boat in this benighted country. 

‘Good,’ he said softly and then the face became feminine again. She smiled archly. ‘Come on big boy,’ she added roguishly. ‘If you’re good I’ll let you have some fun later.’

Fulk grinned wolfishly. ‘Yaass Missteress,’ he said.

‘Good boy.’

* * *

Tamar woke up in a darkened room. She was on the floor; there was no furniture, and there were blacked out glass windows all around her, she panicked and tried to teleport, but it did not work. Now she was really panicking; she began thumping on the glass.

A door opened, and a smooth looking man in a dark suit appeared and bowed courteously. ‘I am sorry about the glass,’ he said. ‘We didn’t think. I’m afraid the unnerving effects of being surrounded by glass on a former Djinn did not occur to my underlings.’ He smiled at her face as he said these words. ‘Oh yes,’ he affirmed. ‘We know who you are Miss – Black?’  He looked mockingly at her. 

Tamar raised a hand threateningly but the ball of lighting that she had expected to throw at this horrible smarmy man (who calls their employees
underlings
?) failed to materialise. She looked at her hand in confusion.

The man laughed.  ‘I’m afraid there’s no magic here,’ he said. 

And Tamar realised that she must be in a pocket universe like Hank’s forest or the Faerie realm.
Damn! These people, whoever they were, obviously knew their stuff.
 But it did not explain how she had got here in the first place. The last thing she remembered was … was weird now she came to think of it.  She refocussed on the immediate problem.

‘I could still rip your arms off and stuff them down your neck,’ she observed calmly. 

‘Yes,’ he agreed. ‘You could, but you won’t.’ he laughed a surprisingly high pitched, tinkly laugh that scraped across Tamar’s nerves like a file.

They had been so afraid that something like this would happen again if they decided to get married. And now it had.

‘What do you want with me anyway?’ she asked suddenly.
Please not another “collector”

The man seemed pleased. ‘Ah, straight to the point,’ he said rubbing his hands together. 

‘You might try the same,’ said Tamar sourly.

‘Well,’ he said. ‘You might say we need your expertise. We did try to recruit you, but now – you might say you’ve been drafted.’

‘You make it sound like there’s a war on.’

‘Quite, quite,’ said the man looking happier by the minute. ‘That’s exactly …’

‘Quinlins!’ A sharp voice came from the air.  ‘That will be enough, send her to me.’

‘The Director wants to see you,’ said the improbably named Quinlins seemingly unperturbed. 

‘I heard,’ said Tamar. ‘I’m not sure I want to see
him,
though.’ 

Two smartly dressed soldiers appeared in the doorway and saluted her respectfully.  ‘This way ma’am,’ said one of them gesturing to the open doorway.

Tamar sighed. ‘Why not,’ she said. She turned back as she left the room with the soldiers and fixed Quinlins with an unfriendly eye. ‘If I see
you
again,’ she said. ‘I’ll snap your neck.’ then she swept away haughtily.

‘I’m not sure what you were trying to prove with that piece of bluster,’ said The Director from behind his desk. ‘Do sit down,’ he added gesturing to the folding chair facing him. 

‘Not that I haven’t felt the same way occasionally about Quinlins, a nasty little bureaucrat, but useful. Please
sit
.’ 

He said this last with such quiet force that it took all of Tamar’s considerable willpower to prevent her legs from folding automatically under her. She remained standing her arms folded defiantly. 

‘God, if I were a younger man …’ said the Director appraising her approvingly. ‘You’re impressive. Quite magnificent really.’

She remembered coming across the two agents who had visited the house, the younger one (what was his name, Dobbins? Dawson?) had not seemed to recognize her
.  
No, that wasn’t it. They had been following her again, just as if they had never… and then …

‘We need your help,’ said The Director cutting across her thoughts.

‘You could have just
asked
,’

‘We
did
ask. You refused.’

‘Then I probably had a good reason, don’t you think? What makes you think I’ll …?’

‘One word,’ snapped The Director. ‘Curiosity.’ He passed a hand over his face and smiled. ‘What am I saying?’ he said. ‘I meant to say “blackmail”.’ He swung the board behind his desk revealing the list of names that had puzzled him for so long. The information on it was a lot more comprehensive now. 

Tamar paled and sat down suddenly.  ‘How did you find out all that?’

‘I know a lot more,’ said The Director. ‘But I do not intend to use it. Not unless I have to.’ he leaned forward over the desk. ‘We are not the bad guys Miss Black.’ 

Tamar was staring at the first entry.

Denis Sanger (Denny) …
Denny, Denny, Denny. Oh god, not Denny.

‘Denny will find me,’ she asserted.

‘He won’t even
look
for you,’ said the Director. ‘Do you think we are such amateurs that we haven’t thought of that. We have –
dealt
with him.’

‘What have you done to him?’ Tamar gasped gripped suddenly in a horrible nameless terror. After all these people had managed to kidnap
her
, they might be capable of anything.

‘He’s fine,’ The Director assured her, ‘but indifferent. He believes you have left him, that’s all. I believe you have been having problems lately. Arguments and so forth?’

Tamar denied it instantly and vehemently. ‘Where do you get your information?’ she sneered with convincing scorn even though her heart had sunk.
They
had
been fighting – terribly, what if Denny… but he would never believe it; he would know she wouldn’t just leave – wouldn’t he? What if he didn’t? What if he – horrible thought – was glad, or at least relieved, that she had gone?

‘I assure you,’ The Director was saying, ‘we are confident in the information our agents have supplied us with.

Those agents! 
Now
she remembered. Dawber and Rook.  She had been walking in the fields behind the house, just thinking, when she had spotted them again trying to keep out of sight, following her, and she had turned to confront them and …

‘Perhaps you would like a tour of our facility now Miss Black,’ said The Director suddenly. ‘I think if you knew what we do here, what we
really
do, you might be persuaded to join us without the need for all this distasteful cloak and dagger stuff.’

‘X files,’ said Tamar vaguely, her mind was elsewhere.

‘Ha!’ said The Director. ‘If you like. The main difference being, we
know
what’s going on out there. The truth, Miss Black, is not “out there”, it’s in here.’ He tapped his head. ‘And I’m pretty worried about it to tell you the truth.’

Tamar snapped back to attention.  She was interested now, despite herself. ‘Okay,’ she said. ‘Let’s hear it then.’

‘It would be easier to show you,’ said The Director. ‘If you would please come with me.’

Tamar rose to follow him, her curiosity rising.

* * *

‘I’m not sure what to do,’ Denny said, after the note had been read by Stiles and Cindy.

‘
Do
?’ erupted Stiles aghast. ‘
Do
?’ he repeated. ‘You go after her and bring her back that’s what you
do
– for God’s sake!’ he passed a hand wearily over his forehead as if it hurt. 

‘She’ll never forgive you if you don’t,’ put in Cindy sagely. ‘I wouldn’t.’

‘So, it’s a kind of test?’ said Denny.

‘Of course it is you maniac,’ snapped Stiles. ‘Haven’t you learned
anything
?’

‘But she doesn’t say where she’s gone,’ said Denny.

‘She doesn’t have to,’ said Stiles impatiently. ‘As she pointed out herself in the note, you can find her anyway.’

‘This could be a good sign actually,’ said Cindy. ‘Women don’t pull this kind of thing unless they want some action. I mean she’s testing you, to see if you still want to sort things out.’

‘But she
knows
I do,’ said Denny now hopelessly out of his depth. 

‘Women are not obliged to be logical,’ said Stiles, earning himself a dirty look from Cindy.

‘But Tamar always is,’ pointed out Denny.

‘Not about you,’ said Cindy. ‘You must have noticed.’

Denny shrugged. He ran a hand through his hair wearily and said. ‘So you think I should go after her then?’

‘
Yes
!’ they both shouted at the same time.

‘Even though she says not to?’

‘
Yes
!’

Denny still looked unsure. He knew Tamar better than anyone else did and she was not given to playing games of this nature. She always said exactly what she meant and did exactly what she wanted to regardless of the consequences. On the other hand, there
was
something funny about the note, it just did not sound like her. If he tried to imagine her
saying
those things he just could not. He decided on a compromise. He would find her but not necessarily confront her yet.  He made this decision in the full awareness that if she really did not want to be found, she would not be.

He concentrated, reaching out with his mind to her. After a few minutes, he relaxed and let out a sigh. Now he knew.

* * *

There had been something very strange about Agent Dawber’s reaction when she had confronted him. Almost as if he had no memory of ever having been in her company. Agent Rook had looked uneasy and had tried steer his companion away.

‘Stop following me, I already said no,’ she had yelled, and the younger Agent had appeared confused.  In exasperation, she had teleported away and then …