Turning Point (22 page)

Scott felt his head drop forward onto his chest. He stirred and blinked, staring blearily round the dimly lit interior of the coach. ‘Where am I?' he muttered, trying to see out of the window, before remembering there were steel shutters bolted across to stop light from seeping in and prisoners from seeing out.

Lightning, in the seat next to him, gave a shrug. ‘Beats me, but we're here wherever it is.'

Scott groaned. ‘What time is it?'

‘Five-ish.'

‘Morning or evening?'

‘Evenin'.'

At first, Scott thought it weird how the guy had sought him out and befriended him, staying by his side as if glued. He'd wondered if he was gay except he didn't give out any of the usual signals. Then, as if Lightning had eavesdropped on his thoughts, ‘In case you're wonderin', I owe you,' he explained. ‘It's my fault you got arrested. I could see that guy was a nut-case. If I'd kept him away from your bike none of this would have happened.'

Scott didn't argue, glad of the company. He'd have been sitting alone otherwise, the students they'd met in the holding cell determined to stay together, only he and Lightning outsiders. He didn't agree with the guy though. Throughout the long journey from the court to the dockside, the whole scenario of the day, since the moment he had stupidly directed the bike into the side road, had replayed itself over and over in his mind. Every bit of that riot had been planned and if Tyson hadn't blown up the bike, it would have been something else – possibly much worse.

Much of the journey remained a blur, Scott's head pounding and demanding his full attention. Desperate to feel better he'd eventually swallowed four pills, twice the recommended dose, and that had driven it away. By then they were on a ferry to somewhere and the flat-bottomed craft, used to transport cars and lorries, had been tossed around like a matchstick. He'd closed his eyes on that scene too, relieved he'd felt too ill to eat on the coach and anxious to escape the sight of the detainees, their faces the colour of putty, throwing up.

He'd caught sight of Hilary only the once when she stepped onto the ferry ahead of him. One of three girls, they'd been allowed to board first, and he spotted her neat figure as she stood by the officer who was checking their numbers. That had been the final piece of indignity in a whole parade of indignities, designed to make you feel like a worm trodden on by hobnailed boots; your identity reduced to a plastic card worn on a cord round your neck, bearing your photograph and prisoner number. Hilary had paused and swung round, searching through the shivering line of guys desperate to escape the piercing cold of a wind blowing in off the sea. He'd waved to attract her attention but too late. Spotting the hold-up, the officer had yelled a rebuke and pushed her on, before turning to check another identity.

By the time the ferry landed dawn had broken, a pale grey sky streaked with traces of pink and yellow hinting at a brighter day. Shivering with cold and lack of sleep Scot had trailed behind Lightning into yet another coach, one of two waiting outside the terminal, nervously eyeing the guards lined up by the side of the gangway. Different from the English police, who had been mostly cheerful, these men were stony-faced and armed. He wasn't the only one to feel scared then, at the mercy of strangers who used their batons to make up for a lack of English, slapping them noisily against the palm of their hands. The coaches were different too, fitted with metal shutters that obscured all sight of the countryside, a steel-mesh partition isolating the driver in his cab.

‘So where are we?' he repeated. Groggily, he stared through the mesh screen. The driver's cab was empty. He could see him in the headlights talking to some men. A buzzer sounded, cutting angrily across the night sky. Scott jumped nervously, watching a heavy metal gate slide to one side.

The driver returned to his cab, muttering to the guard up front. The engine rumbled, the coach pulling forward into a lighted yard railed by spikes and barbed wire. Yawning loudly, the guard climbed to his feet. Stretching, he undid the padlock on the heavy metal screen. ‘
Allez
,' he grumbled beckoning his prisoners.

The sun had set, dusk creeping silently through the sky like a burglar entering a house, the dark shape of a building nestling against a backdrop of hills like a shadowy halo. Stumbling a little, he followed the line of detainees through open swing doors, noticing the second coach already parked up. After the darkness of the coach, the light was momentarily blinding and he flung up an arm to shield his eyes, the blurry confusion gradually clearing into a square lobby, broken up by a series of doors.

The guard pointed with his baton. ‘
Toilette.
'

Swinging on his heel, he kicked open a pair of doors to what looked like a classroom. A line of chairs faced a wall screen, each with a narrow writing table built into its frame. Desperately tired and in need of sleep, Scott trailed into the room and crashed down in the first empty seat. At the front of the room a man was waiting. In his forties and only of medium height, his dark hair had receded at the temples while a heavy stubble decorated his chin. His whole demeanour screamed soldier, his shoulders strained back as if locked there with constant exercise. He waited for the shuffling figures to settle, impatiently slapping the cane he was carrying across his palm, mimicking the action of the men at the docks.

‘The first thing you need to learn,' the man said in English, his voice commonplace without any discernible accent, ‘is that this is not a holiday camp. It is one of three specially equipped punishment centres set up to accommodate louts like you.'

Within five minutes, Scott knew they were in for a week of absolute hell, their instructor's gaze patronising, greedily relishing his role of power. It had been bad enough enduring the short walk from the coach to the ferry, noticing the contemptuous looks thrown at them by members of the public who had travelled in the relative comfort of the ship's lounge. Compared to a week in this man's company, that had been a walk in the park. So far, all they'd been offered was water and no sleep.

‘Sleep deprivation is part of the course, so is lack of food. Grumbles and complaints will result in time being added to your sentence.'

James, across the aisle from Scott, opened his mouth to object and Chris hastily nudged him. Scott stared bleakly along the rows of guys, seeing anger, despair and fear in their expressions, and was surprised to find only eighteen – not the twenty he had counted onto the coach. Puzzled he checked again, wondering where they'd got to. Perhaps they'd wandered into the second group by mistake? There had to be a second group, although so far there'd been no sign of anyone apart from them. Still, Hilary had to be here. It was the same coach in the yard that had picked them up at the docks.

‘Talking is not permitted other than the minimum. You are not here to make friends.' The man slapped the cane viciously against the side of his leg. Scott jumped at the hollow sound, suddenly registering it was a prosthetic limb. At some point in his career he must have been wounded and invalided out of the services, his left leg amputated above the knee. He stared at the figure pacing across the floor and picked up on a faint limp brilliantly disguised. ‘Your goal is to be reinstated in society. Each of you,' the instructor swung the cane along the rows, ‘has landed here because of a crime against the state and in my book that makes you a pariah. From this point you're on your own. How you survive is up to you. You'll find no friends here. Everyone is to be considered an enemy. For reporting misdemeanours, extra food will be awarded.'

James leapt to his feet, boiling over with indignation. ‘You can't do that. Under human rights legislation, even prisoners have rights.'

‘Rights?' The cane slapped against the wooden surface of the front desk so hard Scott thought it would crack. ‘I agree. Human beings do indeed have rights. Turn round.'

James glanced back over his shoulder.

‘You see a number on the back of your chair?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘Yes,
Mr Reynolds-sir
.'

‘Yes, Mr Reynolds-sir.'

‘As long as you remain in this establishment, you are Number Thirty. And numbers do not have rights. Remember that.'

Scott swivelled in his seat to read the number printed on the back. The room had been built to accommodate twenty-four students, and a quarter of the seats remained empty. He and Lightning were seated nine and ten.

‘If you show a willingness to learn what we have to teach you,' their instructor continued, ‘an ability to obey orders without question, you will be side-lined into a special division where you will be offered a job with good money.'

The man clicked a remote and the screen flicked into life. Scott watched the images take shape into a re-run of the march in Exeter. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a puzzled frown sweep across Lightning's face and knew he was asking the self-same question. How did they get hold of the tape when the CCTV cameras had been vandalised?

Familiar figures flooded onto the road where Scott waited with the Suzuki. He heard the hyena-like laugh ring out and caught sight of Tyson. He flinched back, almost expecting the guy to fight his way out of the screen. It looked worse in playback mode, angry figures throwing punches into the face of innocent bystanders for no reason that he could see, as if a bell had rung in their heads, a starting pistol for violence.

Even as the thought took hold, the scene switched to soldiers marching in perfect rhythm, heads turned, their bodies angled backwards not a foot out of step, saluting men standing on a balcony overlooking the parade ground – the antithesis of disorder. Tanks rolled past. The camera flicked again and Scott recognised Paris even though he'd never been there, the unmistakable silhouette of the Eiffel Tower in the background. A huge crowd surged along the street, their arms linked. They were chanting. Then chaos struck. Instantly, the volume on the soundtrack increased till the air vibrated with screaming and cries of terror, the noisy outburst jerking the drooping heads of the exhausted inmates abruptly upright. The marchers all seemed to be students, most of them carrying banners. Scott recognised the word, ‘
non'
but that was all. Police in riot gear were waiting. Batons at the ready they charged into the marchers, beating at them as if threshing corn in a field. Water cannon tore into the ones still resisting, the force of the jets tumbling them head over heels. Panic reached out from the screen, alarm and terror streaked across the faces of the marchers. The occupants of the classroom stared blankly and in silence. All Scott wanted to do was close his eyes and block up his ears so as not to listen, but the noise was everywhere, bouncing off the walls and ceiling. Silence. He opened his eyes on a scene of total order, a parade of stern-faced soldiers, the volume reduced so that only the dull thud of a thousand boots hitting the ground was audible.

It was like being on a switchback ride. You reached the unendurable, the summit of the ride, the pinnacle of pressure on your lungs, desperately shrieking out for it to stop; then the image changed and you were on a gentle slope, like a country walk, your senses soothed by order and calm. The repetition was endless. Chaos versus order. Unbearable images of youngsters being mown down by guns or beaten to the ground by men in authority. Scott didn't recognise to which country they belonged, there were so many and all different – constantly replaced by an orderly procession designed to caress the senses, a crowd applauding enthusiastically. Scott dragged his exhausted mind into gear. There had to be a purpose behind the showing of the film, but what? The embryo thought vanished, blasted by a tirade of new atrocities. Shattered, he shut his eyes, jerking them open as the cane slammed down on the table in front of him.

‘Number Nine. You sleep when I say.'

Scott gulped, feeling his head slouch to one side, finding it difficult to hold it upright, his headache pounding away again.

The relentless switchback ride continued. Hunger came and went, fatigue followed and left by the back door replaced by visions of yet more violence. Several of the guys were openly crying, wiping their tears away as calm once again took over the screen. Scott found himself praying for those moments, to take a breath and close his eyes, no longer bothering to work out why, content to bask in the lull like sunbathers on a beach who, seeing a storm in the distance, are desperate to soak up the last rays of sun before it struck.

The screen flickered and blacked out and a collective sigh ran round the room.

‘On your feet – you have twelve miles to do before your next class. Pick up a bottle of water on your way out.'

Scott crawled to his feet, grateful that the relentless battering was finally over. To his surprise, he felt a fist in his back pushing him to the head of the little queue of weary figures, most leaning against the wall, their eyes shut.

‘You fit?'

‘Why?'

‘I said: you fit?' Lighting repeated slightly louder. Scott saw his hand resting horizontally across his middle, one finger angled upwards.

‘Yeah.' Scott pounded his feet in a semblance of energy and glanced nonchalantly at the video camera in the corner of the room. ‘Those marchers, I wonder how long it takes to get them perfect like that.' Lightning was playing some sort of game; he hoped he'd understood the warning right. He caught a faint movement of the guy's eyelid and then they were outside.

He was surprised to find it dark. Behind the little group, the building was a blur of silence as if everyone in the world was asleep apart from them, its windowless shape leaving no clue. Scott frowned, trying to recall whether it had been night or day when they first arrived. He glanced down at his watch, the luminous digits standing at three-fifteen.
Holy crap!
He stifled a groan. It was the middle of the night. His stomach griped confirming his worst suspicions. Twenty-four hours, and no food except for the sandwiches and crisps he'd shared with Lightning, once they'd recovered from the seasickness of their stormy crossing.