The floor beneath their feet trembled as the subsonics kicked in and Will shut his eyes, leaning back against the wall. That way he didn’t have to look at the large hole in the floor, or Dickson’s angry face. Good job Bluecoats weren’t allowed to carry anything stronger than a Zapper, or Will would have another funeral to speak at. And this one really would have been his fault. Stupid, stupid, stupid…
At last the scanners gurgled and pinged to a halt.
‘Right, that’s your lot.’ Stein stuck a finger in his ear and wriggled it. ‘Give us two minutes to pack up and we can all go home.’
They filed back into the blood-smeared toilet, doing their best to stay out of the way as Beaton and Stein battered and cursed the equipment into its casing, then chucked it out into the corridor for Private Dickson to look after. Beaton produced a body-bag, squatting to pick up chunks of red and purple meat from the sticky tiles.
Now that the scanning gear was out of the way there was nothing obscuring Will’s view of the dirty room. Broken sinks. Walls covered with graffiti. Cracked mirror. The floor was peppered with dead flies, their little shiny bodies not robust enough to stand up to the scanners. Blood everywhere. Will didn’t envy the poor sod who’d have to sanitize the scene when they’d gone…
He frowned. A set of cleaning equipment sat abandoned in the corner: mop, wheely-bucket, scrubbing brushes, big container of industrial disinfectant.
‘What happened to the halfhead?’
The Bluecoat in the green suit frowned. ‘Halfhead?’
Will pointed at the mop and bucket. ‘Know anyone else who’s going to be scrubbing urinals in this part of town?’
‘Damn.’ Her mouth became a thin line. ‘I’ll get someone to look in to it.’
That was two points he’d picked her up on. Have to watch that if he didn’t want the old hostility back.
‘Of course,’ she said, while Will did one last tour of the crime scene, ‘down here halfheads go missing all the time. We’re pretty sure it’s the local militia: they grab them, torture them for a couple of days, then kill them. Never any proof, but we know they do it.’ She gave a short laugh. ‘Believe it or not, there’s a rumour going round that they eat them. Kind of a ritual cannibal orgy thing. Can you believe that?’
Something cold slithered down Will’s spine. All he needed now was the sound of homemade drums in the darkness. Corridors. Death. Blood. His heart hammering rusty nails into his chest.
He wiped a hand across his damp forehead, then turned to see if Beaton and Stein had finished, so they could get the hell out of here…but something made him stop.
The SOC team were wrestling the victim’s torso into the body-bag. Beaton’s dress uniform was covered in a thin film of dust, the chrome buttons smeared with dark red. Will reached out and stopped her from closing the tags over the body.
There was something tugging at his memory, something dark and familiar.
‘What’s wrong?’
Something he’d seen before.
‘Hello?’—Ms Green Suit was staring at him.
‘What? Oh…nothing.’
He stood back and let Beaton seal the bag. The last tag snapped shut, hiding the victim’s ruined face from view.
There was something here. Something he half recognized, but couldn’t quite grasp.
Something that had killed before.
The bluebottles have flown away, looking for something dead to feast upon, letting the buzzing in her head settle down to a dull ache. Everything hurts: the colours, the sounds, the smells. Sharp and sparking. Like electricity dragged across her brain…
She does not think about that. She shuts it out and keeps on walking.
Sparks, and the smell of burning meat.
SHE DOES NOT THINK ABOUT IT.
She stops, one hand resting against a wall of hot brick, the surface rough beneath her fingers. Warmed by the sun and the beat of the darkened heart.
This is what happens when she does not take her medication. Things…break.
A bird lies in the gutter, on its back, a ragged hole in its side, wings crawling with mites. Beak open. Praying to the beating sun in the voice of dead things.
It’s a lovely sound.
She wants to sing. Like the dead bird. But she can’t, because of the sparks and the burning meat.
Because of Him.
She struggles on the operating table, fighting against the restraining straps. It won’t make the slightest bit of difference, but this is no place for rational thought. She’s authorized enough halfheadings to know that. These sharp, broken, terrified thoughts will be the last ones she’ll ever have.
The surgeon tries to say something, but she screams him down. Her mouth is operating on automatic: hurling abuse, obscenities, threats. Then the pleading starts: wild bargains and promises to change. The small part of her that is still lucid watches all this with detached interest: a professional behaviourist, categorizing the mental stages of the condemned mind. She wets herself.
An orderly presses a hypo against her shoulder and pulls the trigger—pins and needles swim through her body as the sedative rides her bloodstream.
She opens her mouth for one last scream, but nothing works anymore. All broken. Her body sags against the chilly metal.
The man is talking again, describing the procedure to the viewing gallery. She closes her eyes and does something she’s not done since she was a little child. She prays. She doesn’t pray for salvation, or forgiveness, or world peace, she prays that the surgeon will fuck this up and kill her on the operating table. That she won’t have to spend the rest of her life like the other lobotomized slaves. That she won’t…
And then the sound starts.
The surgeon pulls the ultrasonic blade from its holster. The sound jumps to a screech as he runs it across the test block—just a few practice incisions—getting a feel for the wand’s hair-trigger with his long, thin fingers.
‘We begin,’ he says, ‘by splitting the lower jaw.’
Gloved hands pull at her lower lip and the wand screeches. Ionized blood and bone fills her mouth. It’s the last thing she’ll ever taste. She tries to tear her head away, but the only things she can move are her eyes, sweeping the operating theatre, the viewing gallery, looking for something, anything to stop this from happening. This is not how it’s supposed to end. She was careful. She was so very careful.
There is a cracking noise. Her whole head shifts, as the surgeon works one half of her jaw free of its socket.
