David Moody - Dog Blood

“Don’t, Danny,” he pleads pathetically, my intent obviously clear, “please don’t. You’re so close now…”

He moves past me quickly, climbs the steps, and opens the door. He pushes it wide open, and I edge a little closer to try to look past him and see inside. It looks bizarrely like a doctor’s waiting room, more like another short corridor than a room-clean, a door at either end, light flooding in through a skylight, a low table and a row of three chairs against one wall. I take a step closer, my curiosity and nerves getting the better of me. Mallon stands there, blocking my way, and it’s like he’s somehow taunting me. Can’t stand this. This bullshit has gone on for too long. I don’t think there’s anyone else in this damn building. I’ll kill him, then fight my way out of here.

I run at the fucker, but he sidesteps, then pushes me into the other room. I spin around as he slams the door in my face.

“Don’t blow it,” he shouts as it shuts. I hear a bolt slide across, then hear his muffled voice still talking to me. “Keep the faith, Danny, you’re almost there. Remember everything you’ve learned.”

I hammer on the door, but it’s no use-it’s locked, and he’s gone. How could I have been so fucking dumb, to walk into a simple trap like this?

I’ll wait for Sahota to show his face now.

I’m ready to fight. Bastard won’t know what’s hit him.

SILENCE. ABSOLUTE, TOTAL FUCKING silence. I stand and watch the other door, waiting for it to open, ready to attack. No one’s coming. Is this another setup? More stupid games? Making me wait and trying to get me to panic and crack? Too late for that now.

Both doors are locked, but the skylight above is open slightly. I climb up onto one of the chairs, my hands still bound together, and try to haul myself up. The rattling chains are heavy around my wrists, and the frame of the skylight doesn’t feel strong enough to support my weight. I’ll pull it down before I-

“Going somewhere?”

I drop, spin around, and throw myself at the figure standing in the other door. I swing my chain-wrapped hands at his head, hard enough to decapitate him. He manages to somehow duck out of the way, then shoves me in the gut. I trip over the chair I was just standing on, falling back and cracking my head hard against the floor. I roll over and try to get up, but this bastard’s fast. He pushes me back down and plants a boot right between my shoulder blades, stopping me from moving. I brace myself for his next strike, but it doesn’t come, and he lifts his foot off. I look back and watch him walk away. Confused, I drag myself up, using another chair for support, suck in a deep breath of air, and turn around to face him.

What? How can he…?

“You must be Danny McCoyne,” he says, but I can’t answer. “I’m Sahota.”

Standing in front of me, wearing a smart, if a little crumpled, pin-striped suit and a remarkably clean white shirt, is one of our people. He’s not Unchanged. I do a double take, but I know I’m right. This man is a friend and an ally, and I immediately know we’re on the same side. He’s short and his build is slight, but he stands tall with confidence and composure. The surprise and confusion he obviously sees on my face are clearly not unexpected.

“Apologies for all the subterfuge and bullshit over the last few days,” he says, gesturing for me to follow him through into the next room. He stops just inside the room as if he’s remembered something important. He checks his trouser pockets, then pulls out a key and undoes the chains around my wrists. He throws them out into the waiting area and closes the door behind us.

All I can do is stand and stare at Sahota. I don’t know what I was expecting, but he isn’t it in any way, shape, or form. He’s a good foot and a half shorter than me, dark-skinned, with close-cropped dark hair, graying at the temples. He has a neatly trimmed mustache and wears a pair of wire-framed glasses. For the first time in months I’m suddenly conscious of my shabby appearance-dead man’s trousers and shirt, no shoes, hair long and shaggy, face covered in stubble and bristle.

“Come in and sit down,” he says, ushering me farther into the room. It’s a wide, spacious, and relatively clean and uncluttered office-cum-living-area. In one corner is a metal-framed bed, similar to the one in my cell but with clean bedding folded back with military precision. Along one wall are several huge, mostly intact windows (only one pane of glass has been boarded up), and in front of me is a large wooden desk with a single chair on either side. Sahota locks the door, then sits down at the desk with his back to the window. He beckons for me to sit opposite.

“Where do you want to start?” he asks in a clipped, well-educated accent as he pours me a drink and slides it across the table.

“Don’t know,” I mumble pathetically between thirsty gulps of water. Truth is, I’ve got so many questions to ask I’m struggling to make sense of any of them.

“Don’t worry.” He grins. “It’s not unusual. You’ve been through a lot.”

“I don’t know what I’ve been through.”

He grins again. “We wouldn’t have done it this way if there’d been any alternative.”

“So what exactly have you done?”

“Which one of them looked after you? Selena, Joseph, or Simon?”

“Looked after me?! That’s not how I’d put it.”

“Which one?”

“Joseph.”

“And what did he tell you?”

“Lots of bullshit about breaking the cycle, not fighting fire with fire, holding the Hate… He said the more I fought, the harder it would get.”

“Did you believe any of it?”

I shrug my shoulders. Truth be told, I’m still not sure what I believe.

“Bits of it made sense.”

“Well, some of what he said must have had an effect on you, because you’re here and he’s still alive. You’d have killed him otherwise.”

“He said I was only locked up here because of the Hate. He said the more we fight, the less we get.”

“And what do you think about that, Danny?”

“I’m not sure what I think.”

“But you must have some kind of opinion. You can’t tell me an intelligent man like you lay there alone in the darkness for hours and didn’t think about what he’d been told.”

“I think he was right when he said we were stuck in a vicious circle and that things are only going to get worse…”

“Go on.”

“But I don’t understand what difference that makes. What else are we supposed to do? We can’t live with the Unchanged, we have to kill them.”

“You’re absolutely right.”

“So how do we win a war without fighting?”

Sahota stands up, picks up his drink, and walks over to the window. He looks out, choosing his next words with care and consideration.

“There is an alternative.”

“Is there? I can’t see one.”

“That’s because you’re looking in the wrong place. You need to change your perspective, Danny, and that’s what this place is all about. That’s why we’re here. Tell me, before we brought you here, did you ever hear anything of Chris Ankin and his plans?”

“I heard his messages when the war started, and I was with a group for a couple of days. They said they were trying to build an army.”

He turns back to face me. “And what did you think of that?”

“Gut reaction?”

“Yes.”

“As soon as we start grouping together in large numbers, the enemy will blow the shit out of us.”

“Exactly right. We’re still outnumbered, and they still have a structured military with a just about operational chain of command. We’d only be able to take the fight to them on limited fronts, and yes, they’d probably blow us out of the water. While we’re concentrating on one of their cities, the others would still be standing strong. They’ve already shown they’re willing to sacrifice thousands of their own to try to wipe us out. You’ve only got to look at how they lost London -”