Nailbiters Read online

  His mobile rang again.

  Martin ran, sprinting up the path and out through the gates of the park.

  He took his phone to the nearest police station to report the calls, but the officer on duty didn’t seem very convinced. ‘Probably just a crank,’ he said to Martin.

  ‘No, no…it’s more than that. This guy was threatening me. He wants to…to hurt me.’

  ‘He actually said that? That he was going to hurt you?’

  Martin thought about it, about the specific words the Voice had used. ‘Well, not exactly but… Can’t you just trace the calls or something? Find out who’s doing this?’

  The policeman examined the phone. ‘Not really, there doesn’t appear to be any record of them even being made.’ He showed Martin the screen.

  Taking the phone back, Martin frowned, then said, ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Look, son, if it continues to happen come back and we’ll see what we can do.’ Before Martin could say any more, the policeman held up his hand, and pointed to the door.

  Martin left, heading home, but he was constantly looking over his shoulder as he walked down the street. He was already on the bus when the phone rang again. Martin ignored it initially, until he began to draw stern looks from some of the other passengers who were not so enamoured with his ringtone. Martin opened the mobile, saw it was ‘unknown’, and closed it. The phone rang again. He got off at the next stop, the tinny tune following him, so he took out the phone and dropped it to the floor, grinding it into the pavement under his heel.

  ‘What are you looking at?’ he shouted at the passers-by who were eyeing him strangely.

  After another sleepless night, Martin went out and bought a replacement phone. A cheap ‘pay as you go’ affair, with a new number he’d let people have in due course. No sooner had he taken it out of its packaging, than it began to ring. Martin didn’t even know it was charged up!

  Assuming it must be some kind of welcome message asking him to load his credit, he pressed the green phone symbol and put the receiver to his ear.

  ‘How about I stamp on you?’ came the now-familiar Voice. ‘See how you like it, you little shit.’ Hands trembling, Martin flung the phone into the nearest public bin. Now that was a threat: a definite threat. But Martin didn’t see the point of reporting it.

  He retreated back home, locking himself away and surviving on what little was in his sparse flat. He didn’t dare go out anymore in case the Voice was watching, waiting. In case it tried to contact him somehow, in spite of the fact he had no mobile. A couple of times the doorbell went, but he didn’t answer it. Couldn’t bring himself to in case it wasn’t his friends, or Tina.

  It was around teatime that the landline in his flat went off for the first time. Martin instinctively reached for the receiver, then stopped; he couldn’t believe he’d almost answered it.

  The phone rang off, though, after an appropriate time, leading him to conclude that it might not be the Voice at all. Martin picked it up, once he knew it was safe to do so, and dialled 1471. It was a number he didn’t recognise, but it was a number nonetheless. Not the Voice. Couldn’t be; it wasn’t that stupid. Didn’t leave traces.

  Martin pressed 3 to return the call.

  ‘Miss me?’ said the Voice.

  ‘Now I’ve got you,’ said Martin, slamming the receiver down. He had the guy’s number. Could take it to the police. Except when he tried 1471 again, the computerised lady informed him that the number had been withheld. ‘What? No – it was there a minute ago.’ Shit, he should have written it down.

  Martin slumped to the floor, breathing quickly in and out. He was going insane, had to be. It was the only explanation. The Voice belonged to him, he was hearing it when it didn’t really exist.

  The phone rang again, making him jump. Martin considered pulling it out of the wall, but what good would that do? The Voice would find a way in.

  The phone rang off again anyway.

  Martin hung his head in despair.

  * * *

  The phone didn’t ring at all the rest of the evening, not even when Martin took to his bed again – trying to get some much needed sleep. That’s probably what’s happening to me, he thought, probably what’s doing this. I’m knackered.

  He lay awake, however, staring at the ceiling; too wired to let sleep claim him. When the phone rang a final time in the middle of the night, it didn’t come as any surprise. But it did chill his blood, and the longer it went on the more he shivered. It was not going to stop, Martin realised, so he got up and padded through the bedroom, into the living room – intending to throw it out of the window. But when he reached the phone he actually found himself picking it up.

  Enough was enough, and he was about to speak when the Voice got in first.

  ‘Hello again, Martin. Don’t hang up.’ It sounded more reasonable than it had in a long time, but then it always did do to start with. ‘You need to hear this.’ The Voice was so much clearer, so much louder than it ever had been before.

  Martin gripped the receiver tightly with both hands, almost like he was trying to strangle the thing.

  ‘You need to hear this and you need to turn around.’

  Martin could sense someone in the room with him, even before he turned. Could see the shadow now cast on the wall from the streetlamp outside. That was why the Voice was so clear – it was so, so close.

  ‘That’s right,’ said the Voice, its tone hardening again. ‘I’m here, Martin. You can’t cut me off this time.’

  It was only now that Martin glanced down, spotting the phone lead. Seeing that it had been severed. Martin closed his eyes briefly and swallowed. He knew the Voice was telling the truth. Knew as well what he would see when he did as it asked. The Voice was right, he couldn’t hang up this time.

  But the Voice could cut him off – and that was its intention. To cut him off permanently, leaving behind a dead line.

  ‘Goodbye, Martin,’ whispered the Voice.

  And, dropping the receiver, Martin slowly turned around.

  The Torturer

  I’m not sure how long I’ve been here. A few days, a week maybe? It feels like a lot longer. I’ve not seen a soul since I arrived, either; shoved inside by rough hands like some kind of animal. I didn’t see the men – I assume they were men – who grabbed me, kidnapped me. I know it sounds like a cliché, but it really did all happen so fast. And it was dark, too. As dark as it is here in this…cell. Yes, I suppose that’s what you’d call it. One tiny window lets in a little light, just enough so I can make out what the place looks like. Four stone walls surround me, slimy to the touch. It’s damp in here and smells of faeces and urine. Mostly mine. There’s no bed, so I have to sleep on the cold floor. At night I feel things crawling over me, insects and I think rodents of some kind as well. Needless to say, I’ve slept very little of late.

  My stomach lets out a cavernous growl. I clutch at my noisy abdomen but it does nothing to stop the rumbling. Hardly surprising as I’ve not eaten so much as a scrap of food since my incarceration. I sometimes wonder if they’ve forgotten all about me, the people who put me here. Or left me to die for some reason I can’t even begin to fathom.

  If so, then I’m not the only one.

  Even now I can hear distant crying. It might be coming from the cell next to mine, I can’t tell, but the very sound of another human being gives me some hope. I’ve tried banging on the wall and the locked metal door – which must be at least several inches thick – to elicit a response, from either my captors or from the poor unfortunate who shares my fate. But I never receive a reply.

  It’s like you can feel yourself going insane, in stages. No, not insane. Not yet! We were never meant to be alone like this, imprisoned. It’s inhuman.

  I pace up and down in the limited area allotted to me, trying to think things through clearly; to work out why I’m here. I’m not rich, am I? I don’t think I’m famous, so no one will pay a ransom for me. Nobody bears me any kind of grudges that I
can recall.

  Perhaps it’s just an arbitrary thing. My being here could be a random act. Wrong place at the wrong time. Terrorists trying to make a point by snatching the first person they came across.

  If only they’d let me go. I wouldn’t tell anyone. What the hell do I know to tell anyone anyway? Oh Jesus, why won’t they just let me go?

  The footsteps are loud. Because of the absence of any other noise (apart from the muted crying), I hear them instantly. The soles of heavy shoes beating out a rhythm down the corridor. Closer, closer. The tapping gets louder…then stops.

  I think someone is outside my cell. I’ve been praying for this moment for days, yet now that it’s here I’m backing away from the door. Why am I so scared? I’ve done nothing wrong. Have I?

  A metallic jangling, keys rattling: lots of keys. How many prisoners are there here? One is being inserted in the lock. Thrust in hard and turned ferociously. It makes a sound akin to nails on a blackboard. I quiver involuntarily.

  The big door opens, but the corridor is as dimly lit as my cell. I can just about discern two large shapes, possibly the men who threw me in here. Smudged figures, black upon black, come into the chamber. I make myself small in the corner, but they still find me and lift me up. They ignore my protests and my feeble blows bounce ineffectually off their hardened bodies. Even if I wasn’t weakened by lack of sustenance, I doubt whether I’d be any more of a match for them.

  I’m pulled through the door and my feet scrape along the uneven ground of the corridor. I look up in the vain hope that I might see a face, something to give me a clue. But their countenances are still deep in shadow.

  ‘Why are you doing this?’ My question disappears along the length of the hallway to be repeated over and over by a vague imitator. There’s no answer forthcoming.

  They kick open the door to a side room and deposit me unceremoniously inside. The men have vanished, leaving the door wide open. This is my chance to escape! But as I limp as fast as I can to the exit, the way is blocked by another person. He walks into the room, and brings the stench of evil with him.

  Reaching around just outside the door-frame, he finds a light switch. Instinctively, I look up as the naked bulb comes on. The blaze of sudden light sends me blind. I see whiteness, then purple dots cartwheel across my field of vision. I bring a hand up to shield my eyes and blink rapidly. It takes a good few minutes for me to adjust to my new…illuminated state.

  Slowly, I look around the room, and things start to come into focus like props in a low-budget movie. It’s slightly larger than my cell – though not much – and there’s a table in the centre with two chairs on either side of it. The furniture isn’t fancy; it’s practical. The kind a carpenter might have in his workshop.

  Then my eyes come to rest on the man, a thickset fellow with a wide neck. He appears to have no cheekbones to speak of and two sloping pencil-thin eyebrows meet in the middle of his brow. Below these are a pair of dark brown, almost black, eyes – framed by octagonal glasses with thin metal rims. The glasses seem to magnify not only his pupils, but also the power they have to gaze deep into my very soul.

  His hair is greying at the temples. It looks like a military cut that has grown out some. And he is dressed in a black shirt and trousers. In his left hand he holds a clipboard.

  When he speaks his voice is flat, almost toneless: ‘Please, take a seat.’

  I don’t know how to react to this, but in the end I obey. With all the grace of a world-weary traveller, I slump down in one of the hard wooden chairs. If nothing else, I may get some answers now.

  I wait for him to sit opposite in the other chair. He doesn’t. He hovers above me, scrutinising as an owl does with a mouse before the kill.

  ‘Splendid. Now we can begin.’ His expression of indifference turns into a sneer. ‘Please tell me your name.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Your name. Quickly.’

  ‘Andrew…Andy Brooks.’

  The man stops to write down something on his clipboard. ‘You know why you’re here, of course.’

  I shake my head.

  ‘Oh, come now. You do know, Mr Brooks. Think.’

  I had done nothing but that since I got here. I was no closer to understanding any of this than when I started.

  ‘No? All right, if that’s the way you want it. Tell me how you came to be here.’

  ‘Your people grabbed me and—’

  ‘Before that. Tell me what you were doing before that. What you have been doing for the last few months, the last few years.’

  He seems impatient, as if he knows this information already. I open my mouth to answer him…and nothing comes out. I’m horrified to discover I can’t remember anything before they seized me. Where had I been? On the street? In my house? (My house? I can’t even remember where I live.)

  The man bends over me, expecting an answer. I want to give him one, desperately; it doesn’t seem prudent to do otherwise. But my mind’s a complete blank. I know this, truly I do. It’s just temporarily out of reach. No matter how hard I try, I simply can’t access it.

  ‘Your answer, Mr Brooks.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I—’

  He swings the clipboard around, missing my head by centimetres, then slams it down on the table.

  ‘Not good enough. Who do you work for?’

  ‘I…I don’t remember. What’s all this about?’

  ‘It’s very simple. You tell me which side you’re on. Make life easy for yourself.’ He walks past the back of my chair and I feel his hands on my shoulders.

  ‘I’m not on anyone’s side.’

  His grip tightens, his fingers inching towards my neck. ‘We’re all on one side or the other,’ he says. ‘I’m not a patient man. You should know this. I’ve been hired to do a job, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do, Mr Brooks.’

  Despite his proximity, I can feel the anger welling up inside me. Just who the hell does he think he is?

  ‘Listen, where am I? What do you want from me?’

  ‘I’ve told you that already.’ His dispassionate voice is getting to me.

  ‘When am I going to get something to eat?’ My humble attempt to sound assertive.

  ‘When you answer my questions. Who do you work for and what have you done?’

  ‘What have I—’ The hands close around my neck, forcing a puff of breath out of me. I try to prise the fingers from around my throat, but the grip is like iron. My windpipe is being crushed and I hear myself coughing, wheezing. I can feel the pressure building up behind my eyes. If I don’t get air soon I’ll—

  Then he shoves my head forward so that it collides with the edge of the desk. My forehead throbs wildly and a wetness is running down my cheeks. The liquid is too thick to be tears and I realise it can only be my own blood. My vision becomes blurred again and this time I black out.

  In my dream I see people standing around me in a darkened cell. Like the men who came for me, they are just silhouettes at first. One of the number steps up to point at me, except…except his hand is hanging off. It dangles from his arm on a piece of loose flesh, the forefinger raised as it spins round. And now he’s stepping closer, into the light. Oh God!

  I’m roused by someone slapping my face. It is my interrogator.

  ‘It’s not polite to pass out in the middle of a conversation,’ he says.

  My head is aching fit to burst, and when I swallow for the first time it feels like his hands are still at my throat. Hot bile rises and I turn to the side to spit it out. I can’t turn far, mind, because my arms are strapped to the back of the chair. Also, my shirt has been ripped open at the front to reveal a sweaty and pale chest.

  ‘Do you remember what we were talking about before you “dropped off”?’ I attempt to nod, but think better of it. The man continues anyway. ‘Good. My question still stands. Who do you work for?’

  ‘Told you.’ My voice sounds strange, slurred. ‘Don’t remember.’

  ‘I refuse to believe that.’ He
stands back and picks something up off the table. It takes me a moment to work out what it is: a length of black plastic wire with a frayed end. The man coils an amount of it around his hand and leaves the rest to droop over his fist.

  The Torturer smiles. Then he brings the wire across my exposed skin like a whip. A white-hot fire runs along its tip and burns my chest. I feel pain like I’ve never experienced before. A cut opens up just below my collarbone. Two more strikes follow in quick succession: one across my stomach, the other just shy of my neck.

  I writhe forward on the seat and groan. I convince myself not to scream; it’s hard but necessary. I won’t give him the satisfaction. Biting on my bottom lip helps a little.

  ‘We’ll try again. Tell me what you know.’

  Panting, I look into his eyes – those hard nuggets of coal. ‘My name is And…Andy Brooks. I don’t remember any more.’

  Another swipe, across my hands this time. The knuckles weep red tears.

  ‘Tell me.’ He doesn’t shout, but his speech is louder; frustration begins to emerge.

  ‘N-Nothing to tell.’

  The slashing goes on until my torso is raw. I say nothing to him. How can I, when I don’t know what he wants? As a last resort he starts on my face. I can’t even begin to describe what this is like. My head rocks from side to side with each crack.

  Eventually, he is forced to let me go. I’m vaguely aware of being carried back to my cell, but before I leave I think I see someone else in the torture room with the man. But then, I can’t be sure of anything in my state.

  They leave me be in that dismal cubicle and I can do nothing but lie on my back, trying to will the agony to die down. It doesn’t, of course.

  I don’t know how, but I fall asleep right there and then. Maybe it’s the exhaustion, or the body’s way of healing itself. I don’t know. Don’t care.

  Anyway, I’m back in the place with the mutilated man. There are more people gathered around him, not just men, but women and children too. Their wounds are abhorrent. I see one girl, she can’t be more than twenty-five, with a long piece of metal sticking out of her side, ragged and sharp. It’s in much further than any foreign object should be. How can she still be alive? I ask myself.