Strangled Silence (24 page)

'What's this one down for?' a voice asked.

'Number twenty,' another answered. 'The right
one, with minor shrapnel scarring.'

'Poor sod. Well, at least he's just losing the one.
Right, let's get him in there.'

Hands started to undo the straps. Ivor remained
limp. He had no idea how fast he'd be able to move
after lying here for all this time, but he was going to
get out of this bloody room if it killed him. The
restraints were taken off. He hoped they would not
look at the monitors, notice how fast his heart was
going . . . The sensor was slipped off his finger and
hands took him by the shoulders, hips and shins.
There were at least three men . . .

'One, two, three –
up
!' one of them barked.

He was hoisted over onto the harder, flatter
mattress of a trolley. A faint gasp escaped from his
lips as he flopped down and he thought he'd given
himself away, but they paid no attention.
Unconscious bodies did that too, sometimes.

Someone leaned over him: he could sense the
shadow on his closed eyelids and their breath on his
face.

He heard the snap of the trolley's straps being
unwound. Ivor opened his eyes and snatched at the
head above him, seizing it by the hair with both
hands. With all his might, he butted the man in the
face. The drip tore from Ivor's arm, the wound
spitting blood.

There was a second man by his feet and Ivor
kicked him in the chest. With a strength born of
terror, he sent the man sprawling across the floor.
Ivor rolled off the side of the trolley, away from the
third man, who grabbed him by the flimsy hospital
tunic he was wearing. Ivor swung his elbow back
into the man's teeth and tore himself free. The door.
He had to make it to the door. His legs wobbled
under him at first, but sheer desperation got him to
the doorway. The men, who were dressed in orderlies'
scrubs, were already coming after him. He
slammed the door after him, nearly running into
another trolley outside. Pulling it over, he kicked it
back into the path of the orderly nearest him,
knocking the man off his feet.

Ivor ran, his bare feet slapping over the
linoleum, his ripped tunic hanging open at the
back. Whimpers slipped from his throat as he
sprinted for a set of double doors ahead of him. A
man in a soldier's uniform came through just as Ivor
reached them and Ivor hit him with the flats of his
hands, hurling the soldier back through the doors.
Ivor brought his knees down hard on the man's
chest, grabbed his head and banged it on the floor.
The uniform had no insignia. Who was he with? A
private security contractor? Special Forces? The
soldier was wearing a side arm and Ivor yanked it
from its holster, flicked off the safety, turned and
aimed it straight at the chest of the man behind
him. The orderly skidded to a halt, his two
colleagues nearly running into him as he did so.

'Back off !' Ivor shrieked at them, his voice high
and frantic. 'Lie down! Down on the floor!'

The men did as they were told; their faces were
masks of restrained frustration. The soldier was on
security detail; Ivor found one set of handcuffs on
his belt and some plasticuffs in a pouch. He quickly
bound the wrists of all four men, interlocking their
arms so they were tangled together. Then he started
running again. Behind him, the men were already
shouting for help.

Reaching a crossroads in the corridor, he
stopped, heaving in breaths. Which way? Jesus,
which way? How did he get out of here? A normal
hospital had signs in the corridors and hallways,
labels on the doors. There was nothing here to tell
him which way to go. To his right, a door opened
at the end of that hallway. Ivor ran towards it as a
man came out. Ivor lifted the gun, putting his
fingers to his lips, demanding silence as the man's
shock registered on his face. The man was dressed
in pale blue surgeon's scrubs; he raised his hands in
reflex when he saw the gun. Ivor seized him by the
shoulder and spun him round, his arm around
the surgeon's neck, pushing him back through the
door, holding the gun to his temple.

There were two other men in the room and
one woman, all dressed in scrubs. They stood up as
Ivor barged in with his hostage. He looked around
in bewilderment, not understanding what he saw.

It was a bizarre mix of a military strategic
planning room and a doctor's consulting room. On
two walls were physical and political maps of the
various trouble spots in Sinnostan, as well as a table
with a plasma display currently showing the region
around Tarpan. There were a number of computer
terminals and two free-standing transparent displays
down the middle of the room. The tables were
littered with reference books of different types. On
the other side of the room were a number of
easy chairs and couches, along with anatomy
charts, pharmaceutical charts, a white board,
wall-mounted light-boxes displaying X-rays as well
as what looked like diagrams of different kinds
of armaments: rifle and handgun ammunition,
grenades, artillery shells, rockets, all accompanied by
photos of the kinds of wounds they caused. Three
cups of coffee stood incongruously on a low table
between the couches.

'What the hell's going on?' Ivor wheezed. 'Who
are you people?'

That was when he noticed the roulette wheel.
Set into a dark wooden counter in the very centre
of the room, it was so out of place he didn't realize
what it was for a moment. But there was no mistaking
it now that he stared at it. It was big; there
were at least a hundred slots . . . no, he could see the
number 101 from where he was standing. What was
a roulette wheel doing in a hospital? Was this
even a hospital at all?

Nobody had answered his question. There was
an oriental man with slicked back hair and a goatee
in front of him. The others were looking at him. He
was probably in charge. Ivor pointed the gun at
him.

'Who are you?' he demanded.

'I'm just a doctor,' the man replied calmly, his
accent a mix of Chinese and American. 'I can see
you're confused. That's just the medication – it's
making you a bit addled, that's all. Why don't you
put down the gun? You're scaring everybody.
Nobody here is going to hurt you. You've been
brought here for treatment. You're disoriented and
you need to calm down. Please, put down the gun.'

'Treatment for what?' Ivor hissed at him, his
tight grip on his hostage's neck causing the man to
choke.

'Post-traumatic stress,' the doctor said in a
gentle voice. 'Please put down the gun.'

'
Bullshit!
' Ivor snapped.

He caught the doctor's gaze flick over to the
wall to his left and Ivor glanced round to see what
he was looking at. There, on the wall, was another
chart. It listed different types of injuries, each one
assigned a number. The last number was 101. Ivor
frowned, frantic thoughts racing through his mind.
His eyes opened wide as realization came over him.
Ivor got a glimpse of number twenty before he
caught the doctor looking past him and spun round
in time to fire a shot through the opening door
behind him. A woman collapsed in the doorway, a
flower of blood blooming through the shoulder of
her pale blue tunic. The shot echoed down the
corridor.

'How do I get out of here?' he snarled at his
hostage, pressing the hot barrel of the gun against
the man's temple.

'Agh! Out and to the right, but—'

Ivor shoved his hostage at the Chinese doctor
and pulled the door open, jumping over the injured
woman. He heard the clatter of running feet. An
alarm sounded. Turning right at the junction, he
sprinted for the double doors at the end. I just shot
someone, he thought. What the hell is going on?
Why did I just shoot that woman?

There was no time to wonder if what he'd
done was right. He had seen number twenty. He
knew what they were going to do to him, even if
he didn't know why. What had the orderly said as
they picked him up? 'At least he's just losing the
one.' Ivor ran like he had never run before.

Slamming through the swing doors at the end
of the corridor, he reached a T-junction. Finally, an
exit sign to his left. The sound of hurrying footsteps
behind him. He turned and put two shots through
the door to slow them down. This weapon had
eleven shots. He had eight left.

He reached the next door in seconds, pushing
through it to a large, high-ceilinged vehicle bay
beyond. Two military-style trucks and three APCs
were parked there, but they were not army or
marine vehicles. Who were these people? He could
hear the thumping roar of a powerful helicopter
outside the big steel shutter doors barring the exit
to his right. No way out in that direction – besides,
he couldn't afford to get caught in the open.

He heard shouting behind him. Another door
led down a different corridor, one that looked like
it might skirt the building, maybe to a quieter exit.
Following it for fifty metres, he came to a steel
service entrance. It was locked. The only other door
led back into the building complex. Ivor panted for
breath. Three men in security uniforms appeared at
the bottom of the corridor. They moved like professionals.
They were all carrying semi-automatic
weapons.

Ivor shoved through the interior door and
started running again. The corridor was cold
and sterile, its walls and floors lined with white tiles
that felt slippery under his feet. He didn't see the
alcove to his left until it was too late. A heavy body
hit him, driving him against the opposite wall as his
right arm was skilfully twisted into a lock, pinning
the gun against the wall. As he tried to resist, the
man grabbed his other arm and the gun went off,
shattering tiles and causing his attacker to flinch
aside. They both fell forward, the soldier's weight on
Ivor's. Ivor hit the ground with his arms locked
behind him. His face struck the tiles, blasting a burst
of pain across the left side of his head.

That was when his tooth came loose.

Then he was on a trolley, restraints on his wrists
and ankles. They had given him a drug of some
kind but he wasn't unconscious, just dulled.
Number twenty, he thought. Jesus, aren't they even
going to knock me out first? The lights of the
corridor whirled by overhead, the glow seeming to
drag from one fluorescent bulb to the next as if
following him. He screamed. They paid no
attention. He shrieked and kicked and thrashed
around on the trolley, but it made no difference. His
movements were weakened by the drug, his screams
little more than whimpers. Nobody was paying
attention to him, even if they did hear.

They had taken away his voice.

The sedative they had given him was too weak
again, they were saying. They gave him another
shot. Closing his eyes, he waited for unconsciousness.
It did not come. Were they going to operate on him
like this? One of them noticed that Ivor's eyes were
still opening from time to time. Someone else said
it was nothing to worry about.

He was taken into a room lined with eight
metal tanks. A breathing mask was fitted over his
face, and clips attached to his twitching eyelids to
keep them open. The clips dripped saline solution
into his eyes – presumably to stop them drying out
and obstructing his vision. There was something
they wanted him to see. The mask was strapped on
and he suffered a terrible feeling of claustrophobia.
The sides of the mask covered his ears completely,
blocking off his hearing. His senses were numbed,
but he felt his restraints being removed and then he
was lifted off the trolley and lowered face first into
the tank. His wrists and ankles were slipped into
sleeves of rubber, bound from four points each with
what felt like soft bungee cords. Their grip was
yielding but firm. He could move, but not enough
to touch the walls of the tank, or even his own
sides. His body was so numb he was barely aware of
his own limbs.

He could hear his breath inside his head and
smell the rubber edges of the mask, the faint scent
of old sweat and some other, chemical odour. The
rubber sleeves and a girdle around his waist
supported him as the hands let go and water started
to fill the tank. He wanted to scream again, but he
was too weak. As the water covered his mask and he
knew he was going to be able to breathe, he relaxed
slightly. Then they covered the top of the tank and
everything went black.

The sedative was wearing off. He could tell
because he was able to count up to one hundred
without losing track. His limbs still felt numb. There
was no sensation but the sound of his breathing, the
smells in the mask and the growing pain in his jaw.
He knew why they had hung him face down; it was
to stop his tongue slumping over his throat and
suffocating him if he fell unconscious. The thought
frightened him more than anything that had
happened so far.

What were they doing to him?

He prodded at his loose tooth with his tongue
and felt a dart of pain go through his jaw. Despite
the discomfort, the feeling gave him relief. It was
real, part of him. Something they hadn't taken away.
As fear closed over him, he clung to the sound of
his panicked breathing, the fading smells inside the
mask and the pain in his gum caused by the roots
of his tooth. He wiggled at it again – his friend, the
pain.

Ivor screamed until his throat was raw. The noise
did not stop. It seemed to go on for ever.
Sometimes the lights flashed into his eyes at the
same time, sometimes the white noise deafened
him so much he couldn't tell if the lights were
strobing across his eyes or not. It was so loud he
couldn't understand why his eardrums hadn't burst.
With no sense of touch or smell or taste, his mind
clutched at any sensation. Whenever the noise disappeared,
he relished the silence. But not for long.
Soon his ears ached for some kind of sound, anything
to pull him out of the deaf, blind and empty
void that his senses had become. Anything to tell
him he was still alive.

The lights burned their way into his brain,
making him feel sick with their pulsing. He
retched, but there was nothing to throw up. But
when they were gone, the glow scorched into his
retina assured him that whatever else, he was not
blind. Soon that would fade and he would strain
his eyes for anything, anything to focus his mind
on. He had heard of this kind of thing: torture that
didn't leave a mark. It was mental conditioning,
sensory deprivation, normally used for
interrogations. But nobody was asking him any
questions. Left alone, he had no idea how long he
had been there, or whether he was going to be
left there. Was anybody coming back for him?
Were they going to leave him here to die?
How much time had passed? It felt like weeks,
but he would surely have died of thirst by then.

He screamed again, just to hear something. His
throat was dry and painfully ragged, as if he'd been
swallowing sand. He prodded his loose tooth with
his tongue again. It was almost out, just hanging by
a thread of flesh. There was a certain satisfaction in
feeling it dangle on that strand of skin.

A film started playing on the glass of his mask.
Some kind of heads-up display. It was a scene in
Tarpan, what looked like a market.

'Ivor McMorris.'A man's calm voice spoke into
his ears. Ivor was absurdly happy to hear another
human being. 'You have been hurt. This is what
happened to you. Listen carefully. This is
what happened to you. You were filming in Tarpan
when a bomb went off, injuring you and your
colleague, Ben Considine.'

'No,' Ivor croaked. 'I don't know . . . I don't
know what you're doing, but I know I wasn't hurt.
You're lying and I'm not falling for it. Tell me what's
. . . what's really going on here.'

The display disappeared. The white noise cut
through him, roaring until his ears seemed like they
would implode. He screeched until his voice gave
out. Then there was complete silence. He waited:
blind and deaf and senseless. His tongue pushed at
his tooth. It almost came out and he pushed it back
in again. Biting down, he felt the roots stab into the
bottom of the socket. The strand of gum was so thin
now, easy to break, but he just wiggled the tooth
back and forth instead, saving the sensation for as
long as possible.

The waiting seemed to go on for ever.

'Say something!' he rasped. 'What . . . What are
you trying to do to me? I don't . . . I don't . . . I
don't understand what's happening. What do you
want?'

'I want to tell you what happened,' the man
said gently. 'Listen carefully.'

The market scene in Tarpan reappeared. It was
inter-cut with scenes of a bombing, but Ivor could
tell that these shots were from a different place. As
the pictures flicked back and forth, lights pulsed
behind them and he started to find it hard to keep
his thoughts coherent. The voice was gentle, soothing,
almost hypnotic as it spoke to him. He stopped
wiggling his tooth and listened more carefully. He
started to recite the words as he was told.

'We were sent to the scene of a car bomb in a
marketplace in the middle of the village. It was
gruesome; the injured had already been rushed to
hospital, but there were still a few charred corpses
in the burnt-out cars around the site of the
explosion. Men with hoses were washing the blood
off the road and into the drains. We started filming,
even though we knew the insurgents – or the
resistance, whatever you want to call the bastards –
had a nasty habit of launching follow-up attacks on
the people and the soldiers who gathered around
these bombsites . . .'

And the more Ivor heard of the story, the more
it made sense. Of course this was what had
happened. He couldn't believe he'd forgotten. Why
had he been denying it? He should have trusted the
voice sooner. Every now and then, he bit down too
hard and the roots of his loose tooth dug into his
gum, making him wince. When that happened, he
had moments of doubt about what was happening
– but they were just moments. He was comfortable
here, listening to this man's voice telling him what
was what.

The voice told him they were going to take
him out of the tank. It told him he would not
remember any of this. It continued talking to him
as the top of the tank lifted off and light turned the
water around him into white fire. He was lifted
from the tank, the rigging taken off him, his eyelids
sticky against his eyes after being held in place for
so long. Clenching his eyes shut against the light, he
was already forgetting what it had been like in
there.

'He really hung in there,' someone said. 'That
one took nearly six hours.'

'Well, he's done now,' another one replied, as
they started to ease him onto a trolley. 'Let's get him
into the OR. Shang's going to throw a hissy fit if he
misses dinner.'

Ivor retched, leaning over the tank, but nothing
came out. The water was starting to drain away. He
spat into it, and felt his tooth fall from his mouth.
Watching it sink to the bottom of the tank, he
wondered how it had come out. A minute later, as
he was led out of the room, he had forgotten about
the tooth. A few minutes after that, he had forgotten
about the room.