The Island (5 page)

FOUR

There were seven other people in the room, which looked to be some kind of waiting area. Moulded plastic seats were arranged around the outer perimeter of the room. A large TV screen on one wall was showing some kind of cookery show on the Lomar Network, an elaborate fish tank underneath it, its colourful occupants having no concept of the shitty world they existed within. Chase took a seat, feeling the eyes of the other people on him as he tried to get comfortable. There were four men and three women. One of the people, a dark-skinned man who looked to be somewhere in his fifties, nodded at Chase as he sat. Chase didn’t return the gesture. Two seats down from him was another man. Young and strong. Broad shouldered and slim at the waist. He sat perched on the edge of his chair, tapping each finger in turn against his thumb as the network of nerves and muscles danced in unison in his forearms. He caught Chase staring, the latter quickly averting his gaze and staring at the floor. The third man in the room was pale and blond with a dashing of acne across his cheeks. He had the wide eyed appearance of a deer caught in headlights, and was chewing his fingernails as his foot tapped rhythmically on the floor. Opposite him were what appeared to be a man and wife. Both dressed in army fatigues, their eyes were devoid of emotion as they glanced at Chase. He estimated them to be somewhere in their late forties, and as he looked at them holding hands, Chase wondered what would possess a couple to apply for The Island when only one of them would be able to win if they made it through.

The two women in the waiting room were of similar age, Chase guessed very early twenties. One was blonde and had a coldness in her eyes. She seemed completely relaxed, slumped on her chair, the top of a tattoo poking out from the neckline of her t-shirt. The other girl was different again. Black hair, blue eyes, slim build. She looked fragile, and Chase wondered what in her life could be so bad as to make her want to be a volunteer to take on The Island. He supposed they might think the same of him, and wondered what was about to happen next. One thing was for sure, the experience so far was a million miles away from the vision he had of dropping off his form and going back home. Something felt strange, not quite right. Maybe it was the fear; maybe it was just that it was now becoming more and more real as time went on. Maybe it was because these people in the room might well be his competition, and if they were, there was every chance he might have to kill them in order to win.

Fifteen minutes passed, and although he expected more people to arrive, nobody else came through the door. Chase wasn’t sure if that was a good or a bad sign, and decided he didn’t want to think about it. Instead, he stared at his feet at waited to see what would happen.

As if on cue, the lights dimmed and the screen cut to a view of a beautiful golden beach and a rolling blue ocean. The word ‘LIVE’ flicked up in the corner of the screen. As they watched, Damien Lomar walked into shot. This time there was no suit, no expensive pinkie ring. He was wearing a loose-fitting cotton t-shirt and dark sunglasses. He turned to the camera and smiled.

“Hello from paradise,” he said, the voice slightly out of sync with the images on screen. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be there to greet you personally, but as I’m sure you can understand, I’m a busy man. I’m sure the eight of you are wondering why you are here. I’m sure there are nerves and also a little apprehension. The truth is that despite our generous prize offer and extensive advertising campaign, we struggled to find suitable contestants. Some of you are here after a call back. Two of you are here for the first time after handing in your application forms during the last few weeks. One thing you have in common is that you all made the cut.” Lomar grinned.

Despite what should be good news, the atmosphere in the waiting room was heavy.

“We were looking for a certain class of contestant. People who had a good story to tell, people who had a good reason to fight for what they believed in and who could win. The handprint scan you undertook on your first visit was designed to look for certain markers as well as search through your personal records, looking for certain key traits that we were looking for.” Lomar smiled again, enjoying the sun, letting the news sink in. “In a moment, some of my colleagues will enter the room and further brief you on the next stage of the process. Paperwork will have to be completed, waivers and non-disclosure agreements signed. In three days, if you still wish to participate after signing said forms and getting a full rundown of what will take place, you will return here to this very room. By doing so, you will have passed the point when you can back out. For those who do, we have a reserve list of more than fifty contestants which we will draw from to ensure we have our full quota of bodies on The Island. Returning here will mean you will take part in the show and all that it entails. Use this time to spend time with your loved ones, to remind yourselves why you are taking part. Upon arrival, you will then be transported here, to my island, the place where I make my home. I will personally welcome you and give you a few days of luxury before the arduous task ahead of you.”

Lomar paused for effect. Crashing surf, a breeze ruffling the microphone. “The reason for this is twofold. Firstly, it is to give you the last taste of comfort before what will be the most traumatic and difficult task you have ever undertaken. The second reason is to give you a taste of what could be, to give you a glimpse of the life you could have if you should win. The eight of you are the elite, the season one island contestants. I’m sure you will make for great television, and for one of you, live out the life you always wanted. Hopefully I’ll see you all in a few days. Congratulations again from everyone here at the Lomar Corporation.”

The screen went dark and the lights came back on. There was a heavy silence in the room as the eight people inside came to terms with what they had just heard. Chase, too, was reeling. His day had started as a simple application drop off and had ended with him getting a pale on the show. As the door opened and Lomar’s staff entered with said application forms and waivers, Chase’s mind turned to his wife, and how he was going to tell her that not only had he gone through with posting his application, but was now a part of the deadliest show in the world.

LOMAR

THE SEA STAR

ATLANTIC OCEAN

MARCH 5
th
2044

Chase stood on the deck of the boat, eyes half closed against the breeze as they cut through the water. It was cold, but he didn’t mind. This was the first real ocean he had seen, and certainly the first that was blue instead of the garbage-filled brown of New York where he had lived all his life.

Of the eight of them who had been chosen to take part in the show, two had failed to return. Chase wondered if the couple in army fatigues were the wisest of all for taking the opportunity to back out. For a time, his return to the Lomar building had also been in doubt. He had gone back and told Ashley the news, and although he had expected her to be angry, he didn’t anticipate the outright rage. She had screamed at him, eyes full of fear and betrayal. He let her vent, taking it in and soaking it up, his penance for putting her in such an impossible position. Reason was no longer an option. She knew as well as he did that it was really happening. Eventually she calmed enough to stop screaming, but still she didn’t speak to him, nor did she look at him. He knew why. The sooner she prepared for his death the better, and if that meant ignoring him in what could conceivably be the last days of his life, then she was prepared to do it. He thought she would come around, at least show her support eventually, but even with his bags  packed and standing by the door on the morning he was due to leave, she still ignored him. Eyes down, not wanting to look, not wanting to acknowledge. He had gone into Elsie’s room, but like she was most days, she was sleeping, skeletal and frail, breathing wet and ragged. He didn’t want to wake her. Instead, he kissed her on the forehead, committing the image to memory as a reminder of why he was about to put himself through hell. Grabbing his bag by the door, he looked to Ashley, hoping she would at least look at him, or tell him she loved him, but she simply stared out of the window, eyes raw, cheeks wet. With nothing more to be said, he had left their apartment, possibly for the last time, and set out for whatever awaited him.

“Cold up here.”

Chase blinked, and glanced towards the man. It was the African American man who had nodded at Chase when he had first arrived in the meeting room. His hair was a black and white shortly cropped afro, his beard trimmed into a goatee and sporting the same colour scheme. He had kind eyes, the crow’s feet at the corners giving him a warm, fatherly appearance. Although it felt odd making small talk with a man who he might have to murder, Chase saw no harm in at least being polite.

“I don’t mind it,” he said, turning towards the man. “It feels good.”

Chase looked at the man’s shirt. Each of them had been given the same standard outfit. Boots and combat pants. Ration kit and sleeping bag. Khaki shirts each with their name stencilled both on the back and across the breast pocket in black. AWEYO the shirt read. To his surprise, the old man thrust out a hand.

“My name is Moses. I’d say I’m pleased to meet you, but under the circumstances, I’m not sure that’s appropriate.” He grinned, an honest gesture.

Chase gave his own name and couldn’t help but smile as he shook hands with the older man. “We must all be crazy,” he said.

“Perhaps we are. Either us or the people who organise this barbaric game.”

Chase nodded. He was about to respond by asking what Moses thought of Lomar when the cough came. There was no warning. Chase leaned onto the side of the boat, coughing and unable to catch his breath. When it subsided, Moses was watching him, Chase unsure if the look was predatory or concerned. “Are you alright?” Moses said, the African twang in his voice showing no hint of insincerity.

“I’m fine, just a cough, that’s all.”

Moses nodded. He didn’t believe the lie but didn’t pursue it either. For a moment, neither man spoke, both enjoying the wind in their face and the salt taste that came with it.

“Do you believe you will win?”

Chase was surprised by the directness of the question, and half turned towards Moses. “Do you?”

The older man shrugged. “Surely we all do, otherwise why would we be here?”

Chase nodded. Moses was right. It was both ridiculous and frightening at the same time.

“What brings you to The Island?” Moses asked, jaundiced eyes watching carefully.

“That’s my business. I don’t see the relevance. I’m sure you wouldn’t like to answer the same question.”

“Fair enough. I meant no offence. For the record, I’m happy to discuss my reasons for being here.”

“Go on,” Chase said, not through any interest in Moses’s story, but because he was starting to realise that any information, however small, might give him an advantage later.

Moses leaned on the barrier, Chase noticing how thick and muscular his forearms were. A small alarm started to ring in his head, telling him that there may be more to this man than met the eye.

“I was born in Burma. When I was a child, bandits raided our village. The women were rounded up, raped and murdered. The boys taken prisoner and forced into servitude of the army. I was just seven when I was enlisted, a frightened orphan boy who had lost his entire family in one night. Over the next few years, I was trained to fight, to use weapons. To kill.” He paused as he said it, staring at the white wake of the boat as it rolled away from them. “When I was ten, I killed my first man. Shot him, in the head. I wasn’t proud. I cried myself to sleep. Never in front of my superiors. To show weakness was to die. When I realised no help was coming, I simply went on as normal. I returned to my duties, performing the same raids as those who had taken me. I became as cold and emotionless a killer as those who had taken me from my family. Ironic, don’t you think?”

“Yeah.”

Moses sighed, and glanced at Chase. “I took no pleasure in these things. I did them because I knew that if I didn’t, then I would be beaten and perhaps killed. After a time, even the atrocities I committed were distant to me. By the time I was twenty, I had killed more than two hundred innocent people. It was then, when I realised what a monster I had become, that I decided to flee.”

Despite his decision to keep himself distant from his fellow competitor, Chase was curious. “What happened?” he asked.

Moses sighed, linking his hands as he continued to stare at the ocean. “I left on foot with nothing but a few loaves of stolen bread. I walked for three weeks, frightened and alone. I contracted malaria and dysentery, but still I went on. Still I did whatever it took to get away. For three months, I scraped and begged, stole and borrowed to flee that life. Eventually, I made it to America.”

“And you decided to do this? That seems like a strange decision.”

“I was a young man then. After I spent all that time, scratching and clawing to make a new life in America, after I settled down, worked hard and tried to live quietly, a man came to see me. A man who found out what I used to be and threatened to have me arrested for war crimes if I didn’t pay him.”

Moses sighed, his eyes glazing over. “I don’t have the money. This man says he will make my life hell. Has done for three years now. When times get desperate, a man will go to any lengths to survive.”

Chase recalled the day he tried to buy the handgun. He knew all too well how that felt. “Can’t you go to anyone? Ask someone for help?”

Moses shook his head. “I cannot. My papers are fraudulent. I can’t risk anyone looking into me in too much detail. When I win this show, I will ask that all of my past indiscretions be forgotten, erased, then this man and his blackmail will go away.”

“And what if you lose?” Chase didn’t know why he even asked the question. The answer was an obvious one. Moses shrugged. “If I lose then it doesn’t matter either way.”

Cold cut through Chase, and not just because of the blustery conditions. There was certain finality to those words that applied to all of them. He looked again at Moses, perhaps seeing him for the first time. The man he had thought of as a harmless fatherly type was a killer. Maybe not for some time, but a killer nonetheless. Chase already felt woefully inadequate. Combined with the unforgiving cancer which was eating him alive, he was starting to think he had made a very big mistake.

TWO

The island first appeared on the south side of the boat. Not
The Island
, that would come later. This was Lomar’s island. The temperature had climbed to such a level that not even the forward motion of the boat and the sea breeze could deter its baking heat. Chase had stayed on deck long after Moses had retreated back inside to enjoy the free bar. He wasn’t there on some kind of pleasure cruise. He was there to save his daughter. As the boat turned towards its destination, and the island started to grow larger as they neared, the others came out on deck. Awkward, mistrustful glances were thrown. There were no greetings, no handshakes. Just a cold indifference. It seemed the game was already underway. Chase tried to assess each of them, hoping to discover where he sat in the pecking order as a potential winner or loser. The two girls (one was called Perrie, he didn’t know the name of the other one) had already formed a bond, it had seemed. Their name-stencilled shirts had been removed and tied around waists, exposing slim bodies in matching black tank tops. Both looked to be half drunk already. Chase was curious if they were drinking to forget what was about to happen or having one last blow out before the inevitable shit storm to come. Moses he had already met, the older man hiding those yellow eyes behind reflective black sunglasses. The other two men were as far apart as it was possible to imagine. One of them, the one he recalled from the waiting room with the incessant finger to thumb routine, was called Ryder. He too had dispensed with his shirt, showing off a muscular torso which made Chase incredibly aware that he was out of shape. The girls seemed to be enjoying the view, and Ryder didn’t seem to mind them watching. On his right shoulder was a black and grey tattoo, penned with incredible details. It shows a cobra coiled around a cracked human skull. Below it, in a scroll curling around the skull, were the words ‘no fear of death’. Unlike the rest of them (half-cut girls aside) Ryder looked the most relaxed, and if Chase was honest, the most physically impressive. The other contestant, the one who Chase had seen chewing his fingernails and tapping his foot in the waiting room, was called Alex. The heat had brought out his acne in ugly blotches, and his eyes were still filled with fear as he flicked them to his rivals in turn.

There’s a man who knows he’s made a mistake
. Chase found some comfort in that feeling. On the heels of it was another. In Alex, there was at least one person he thought he could definitely take out if he had to. The rest of the group could smell blood too and as such had already started to distance themselves from him. Based on his initial impressions, Chase suspected he could take all of them out if he needed to with the exception of Ryder and Moses, who he considered his most realistic threat.

The lush greens of The Island greeted them as they pulled up at the dock. They could see the sprawling house halfway up the hillside, a spectacular property with walkways and vast open spaces. They each got their bags and disembarked, waiting on the bright, hot dock and waiting to be told what to do next. As they watched, a figure approached from the house. Clad in brown loafers, crème flannel trousers and loose, white shirt, Damien Lomar jogged down the dock towards them, grin beaming behind tanned skin.

“You made it I see, welcome to my home.”

All six of them gawped at the house, unable to believe that anyone could afford to live in such luxury. Lomar let them gawp for a while, and then clapped his hands together. “Well, if you’ll follow me, I’ll show you around.”

Lomar led them back the way he had come. Chase fell in behind Ryder, getting a close up look at the chiselled back and the muscles which continued to make him feel inadequate.

“For the next three days, you will stay here and go through your final preparations before you ship out to The Island. Think of this as your last taste of civilisation.” Lomar grinned over his shoulder as he said it. Nobody else seemed to find it funny. He led them up the deck steps through a tidy garden filled with palm trees and flowers. “As you all know, the basis of the game is simple. Enter the northern gate as a group. Reach the opposite side of The Island and exit via the south gate. Only one of you can exit, and will only be allowed to do so when all of your rivals have been eliminated.”

The wording wasn’t lost on Chase. Eliminated sounded much better than killed or murdered. Lomar led them into the house, the cool blast of the air conditioning a welcome relief from the intense heat of the day. Lomar led them through a white marble reception room, past the pool table (the Brazilian model was long absent) and down another hallway. Stuffed animal heads watched over them as they passed, then moved into a large, spacious dining room of sorts. “Fan of hunting, Mr. Lomar?” Moses asked. Lomar nodded. “Occasionally. There is nothing more primal than man hunting beast one on one, don’t you think?”

“I wouldn’t know much about hunting,” Moses replied. Chase knew that wasn’t strictly true. The dining room had glass doors down one full length of the room leading out onto a sun drenched patio and swimming pool. A chef in pristine whites stood behind a barbecue, cooking burgers and sausages. Lomar turned to face his audience. Still grinning. “Before I let you enjoy the next few days, there are a few other things I wanted to talk to you about. This will be covered in greater detail tomorrow when you speak to our head of production. What I want you to remember is that this is a television show. Treat it as such.”