Souls At Zero (A Dark Psychological Thriller) (45 page)

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

Most of the kids were understandably confused about what was going on. Naked and afraid, quivering like abused dogs in their cages, many of them crawled away from Black as he tried to coax them out of the rooms they were being held captive in. God knows what was done to them, what physical and mental abuse they had suffered at the hands of Mason and his mind controlled accomplices. Black had read about such orchestrated abuse before, mostly in connection with secret government programs in America, programs such as MK-ULTRA, in which the CIA researched mind control techniques. On a darker level, there was also the institutionalised mind control of groups like the Illuminati, who apparently secretly controlled the whole damn world. Whether that was true or not, the techniques they supposedly used to brainwash their subjects bore a remarkable similarity to the techniques being used by Mason. The idea was to physically and mentally abuse the subject, often sexually, in order to create a split in their mind. Once that split occurred, that person's mind became highly susceptible to outside control. You could, in effect, create a whole new personality for that person, multiple personalities in fact. Black used to think this was all the fevered imaginings of conspiracy theorists, but now that he had seen the evidence first hand, he no longer believed that. The shit was real. Edger's brother was proof of that. Black could only assume that the children he was working on setting free were due to be used as puppets by Mason, or else sold to the highest bidder for use as slaves, which wouldn't be unheard of either.

Either way, Black's only concern was getting the children out. Every one of them seemed so damaged and traumatised, he couldn't help wondering if it wouldn't be more humane to let them die in the coming bomb blast. It would be a quick death. At least they wouldn't have to suffer the memory of their abuse for the rest of their lives, if they could even have a life after everything that had been done to them.

Despite his misgivings, he still felt duty bound to at least try and save the children. Edger was right about him. He was still a cop, for better or worse. His job was to protect, not to kill.

Even if he was going to die himself soon.

As more and more of his lifeblood leaked out of him, he made peace with the fact that he was never making it out of the house alive. He was dead already. All he had to do was get the children out, and then he could lie down and die. His work would be over finally.

It took him ten minutes to coax all the children out of their cells. Over a dozen of them stood around in the corridor, the strip lights above them still blinking on and off, making the pale skinned kids—many of them covered in fresh blood or their own filth—look like a gathering of ghouls, with the slow moving and bleeding Black as their leader.

The blood flowing from the wound in his side was unrelenting. He didn't know how many pints he had lost, but it felt like most of the blood had been drained from his body, leaving him light headed and cold. His lungs too, as if in response to the shutting down of his body, began to burn in his chest, constricting his airflow so that he gasped instead of breathed.

The children stood around in the corridor like frightened lambs, wordless and shaking, staring fearfully at Black and at each other, probably thinking they were about to be subjected to more abuse.

"Alright," Black gasped, trying to keep his voice calm. "We're all going to go now. We're going to leave this place. I'm going to set you all free."

Harrowed eyes stared back at him.

He shuffled around them like a bloody shepherd, rounding them all into one group and moving them along the corridor to the stairs leading up to the main part of the house. They all gathered at the entrance, too frightened to go any further.

"Keep going." Half doubled over, Black tried to usher them up the stairs, but the children didn't move.

Shit.

There was simply no time to be gentle with them. He had to get them out of the house before the bombs went off.

"Move!" he shouted, choking on his own blood for a moment. "Go now! Fucking move!"

A few of the children screamed, but slowly but surely, they began to do as they were told and move up the stairs.

"That's it. That's good. Everything's going to be fine. Keep going."

As the last of the children began to move up the stairs, Black wasn't sure if he could make it himself. It was all he could do to stay standing. He just wanted to rest somewhere, badly.

Don't stop now. At least do something to make your daughter's proud for once.

Gasping for breath, clutching his injured side, he forced himself to climb the stairs, every single step agonising, the pain so white hot and blinding he nearly collapsed several times, before he finally made it up all the stairs to see the children hanging around in the massive foyer. They were all grouped together now like a flock of spooked sheep, which was good, because it made it easier to move them.

The front doors of the house were wide open. The bodies of the two guards Black and Edger had shot earlier lay on the floor near the doors, seeping blood onto the red and black tiles.

Black made a weak motion with his hand. "Go! Out…out the doors…"

A few of the kids looked at the doors, and their faces became even more frightened, like they couldn't face going back into the world again.

One last push. Get them all out.

He somehow managed to summon what little energy he had left to walk down the narrow hallway, and into the foyer, where he goaded the children towards the doors, ushering them all out into the cold night air. The air itself seemed to shake them all out their stupors a bit, and they became somewhat more animated. A few of them broke from the group and ran down the steps and away from the house.

"Follow them," Black said, pointing to the runners. "Go!"

The rest began to back away from the doors, turning their backs as they went down the steps and moved away from the house.

All except one little girl. She must have been no older than ten or eleven, with long dirty red hair, and ugly welts all over her body, like someone had been at her with a strap or a belt. Her large blue eyes stared back at Black just as he finally collapsed to the floor.

It felt like he blacked out for a moment. When he opened his eyes, the girl was standing over him. "Come with us," she said in a small voice.

Black could barely speak. He smiled up at the girl, and in his mind she took on the form of his daughter, Jessica. "I love you," he breathed, before he momentarily blacked out again.

When he opened his eyes next, the girl was gone.

CHAPTER SIXTY

Edger awoke to find himself inside a large room that had red carpet on the floor. Within a few seconds, he worked out he was slumped on a leather sofa. He couldn't move his arms, and he soon realised they were bound behind his back. His ankles were also tied together. There was a dull ache in his skull, and he groaned as he positioned himself up straight.

"Daddy?"

Snapping his head to the side, Edger was shocked to see his daughter sitting beside him on the sofa, tears running down her cheeks, dressed in the same clothes he had last seen her in. "Kaitlin?" he said, blinking hard just in case he was imagining her. An after effect of the gas used to render him unconscious in the lift perhaps?

When Kaitlin threw her arms around him, he knew there was no doubt. She was there with him.

"Mr Edger," said a voice from behind him. "I'm glad you're awake. I was beginning to think I used too much gas."

Edger looked over his shoulder just as Gabriel Mason walked around to face him. The tall professor—now inexplicably appearing much younger than he did while standing on the steps at the front of the house earlier—stood in front of him. Mason was dressed in a dark brown three piece suit and yellow bow tie. He smiled at Edger, then at Kaitlin, then back to Edger again. "Mason what's—"

A thought prevented Edger from finishing his sentence.

The bombs.

"How long?" he asked, his heart banging hard against his chest.

Mason frowned. "How long what, Mr Edger?"

"How long have I been out?"

"About five minutes. The effects of the gas I used don't last long."

Five minutes. That meant there was less than fifteen minutes before the bombs went off.

Jesus Christ. Kaitlin…

"Why is she here?"

"She's been here for a while now," Mason said. "My men must have just missed you at the house in Lisburn. They went there to kill you. When they saw you were gone, they took the girl instead."

Edger looked at his daughter. "Are you okay, Kaitlin?"

Kaitlin nodded, her face pale and drawn, but she seemed okay under the circumstances. "They shot Donna."

Edger shut his eyes.

No.

"Not before she shot one of my men, though," Mason said before moving out of sight for a moment. Edger used the opportunity to check his bonds. Cable ties. Unbreakable unless cut. He looked at Kaitlin, who was sitting close beside him, her head resting against his arm.

"There's a knife strapped to my leg," he whispered to her.

Kaitlin didn't move, but he felt her head nod against his arm.

When Mason reappeared, he had a drink in his hand as he sat down in an armchair facing the sofa, crossing his long legs and staring at Edger with steely blue eyes. Then he reached inside his jacket and took out a pistol, an old German Walther 9mm, and placed the pistol on the arm of the chair.

"What's going on here, Mason?" Edger asked. "Why are we not dead?"

"That's a question I've been asking myself for a while now," Mason replied. "Your former boss Rankin was supposed to kill you all. Until he failed."

"So you thought you would just get me in here for a chat, is that it?"

"Maybe." Mason sipped at his drink as he continued to stare at Edger. "I have to tell you, you've impressed me, Mr Edger. Not only did you allude any attempts to kill you, but you managed to track me down and get through all my security. You might even be better than your brother was."

Edger shook his head. "Why, Mason? Why did you take my brother? All those people? Just kids…"

"I'm a scientist, Mr Edger. I need subjects to experiment on. As it turned out, Declan—or Blutwolf as I named him—had an aptitude for taking pain, which made him a good subject for programming. I turned him into a fixer of sorts. Many of the people and large corporations that I have dealings with around the world—people like the ones lying dead in that room downstairs—often have a need for sticky situations to be taken care of in a manner that is outside the law, shall we say. Blutwolf—your brother—would kill and interrogate on behalf of these companies. And he was very good at it, until he had that unfortunate accident in Italy that disrupted his programming. He went off the grid for over a year, resurfacing again when he went after you. I understand he blamed you for leaving him that night he was taken. We talked about that a lot when he first came here."

"In between torturing him, you mean? I saw the scars on him. I saw the videos."

"I allowed my former followers to indulge their more sadistic tendencies on the subjects. It's a necessary part of programming someone. The mind must be split, and physical and mental abuse is the way to do that."

"Your followers?"

"Yes. They all thought they were part of a secret cult." He laughed. "The Red Falcon Country Club as it was codenamed. It was all just for show, mostly. Silly nonsense. I just needed the resources they could provide, and their protection to an extent, from the law. I gassed the lot of them, as you may have seen. Degenerate lot they were anyway."

"So all those kids you have locked up in those rooms in your basement, they're all due for programming, are they?"

"Yes. They were to be sold off as slaves to buyers in the Middle East. To people who financially supported my efforts as a scientist. Not now of course. I'll be moving on shortly, so I have no further need for them."

No further need. Despicable cunt.

"It's funny, Mr Edger," Mason said, smiling.

"What is?" Edger asked, wishing Mason would move again so Kaitlin could get the knife from his ankle and cut him free. Then he could kill Mason and get out before the bombs went off.

"In as much as I created your brother, I also created you as well. When you think about it, what happened that night put you on the path you are on now. Would you have joined the military if I hadn't of taken your brother from you?"

Edger didn't answer, just stared back at him.

"Think of all that guilt you carried around with you. Think of how it made you such a formidable soldier, how it made you constantly try to make up for your cowardice that night." Mason finished his drink and put the empty glass on the arm of his chair. "I created you, Mr Edger."