The Disappeared (22 page)

His room is tiny and almost bare, but he’s sitting like a king on his throne. I wish I had a private room like this.

When Rice sees my battered face he smirks to himself. I think about what my mother said about the enforcers. It’s true that occasionally you see one of them looking uncomfortable, wincing when they use the EMDs or averting their eyes when one of the little ones cries. Not Rice. He always looks like he’s having a great time. He continues to stare at me without blinking. I fight down the urge to speak; instead I look at him. He’s not much taller than I am, but he still manages to look down his nose at me.

He screws up his mouth. ‘You haven’t had the advantage of growing up in an Academy, Blake,’ he says. ‘But I have already explained that you need to learn and to learn quickly that the way to get on is to obey.’

It’s funny how Rice doesn’t speak to me in monosyllables like he does the rest of the Specials. I’m sure he knows that I really am from a Learning Community. But that doesn’t make me any less nervous about where all this is leading.

‘It seems to me that since the departure of Enforcer Tong there has been some slipping of standards in your grid.’

He’s talking about my mother. He knows.

‘But just because one enforcer is, as yet, unaccustomed to the requisite standards of discipline let me assure you that you will not get away with insubordination.’

Maybe he doesn’t know. I bite my lip.

‘I will remind you one final time that in this institution you
cannot
seek to express your own opinions,’ he says. He’s working his mouth so hard that he’s spitting, but his face remains cold. ‘You should not even have your own opinions, let alone seek to draw others into trouble by sharing your ideas about etiquette at meal times.’

This is about the bowls. I almost sag with relief. I can’t believe it. Does this mean he doesn’t know anything about my mum? But the bowl thing was ages ago; why is he bringing it up now?

‘I will say this one more time. I don’t want you sharing your ideas about crockery, about fairness, about education . . .’

Does he know about the reading lessons?

‘. . . about anything at all. Now, as you have conducted yourself inappropriately you must be punished.’

He’s smiling. The sick bastard. What’s he going to do? Give me a shock? Cut my food? It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters as long as he doesn’t find out about my mother before our escape. I look him in the eye.

‘You are excluded, Blake.’

‘Excluded? What does that mean?’

He stands up and walks out the door. He crooks a finger to show I should follow him. It’s like he’s pretending to be some sinister villain. Pathetic. He leads me back to the main corridor.

‘Does this mean I’m not allowed to attend lessons?’ I ask.

Rice just keeps striding along and doesn’t reply. His face is pulled up like he’s trying not to smell something nasty.

We walk past the empty dining hall. He stops at the back door. What the efwurd is this all about? Blocking my view with his body, he types in the door code. I hear the catch click and he pushes open the door.

The light hurts my eyes. I squint at a scrubby expanse of grass. Cold air splashes me in the face like water. I take a great gulp and suddenly I can feel the difference between the cold clean air in front of me and the thick warm stink behind me. I can’t believe that I haven’t had any fresh air for two months.

‘You are excluded for forty-eight hours,’ says Rice. The corners of his mouth twitch.

‘I don’t understand.’

He is looking at me so intently I feel like his eyes are leaving a mark on my skin.

‘You are
excluded
from the Academy. You may not return for forty-eight hours.’

‘But where do I go?’

‘Out, Blake. You go out.’

He can’t mean what I think he means. ‘Out where?’ My voice is shaking.

His lips curl into a self-satisfied smile.

‘Out into the Wilderness.’

Rice grips my arm and steers me out of the door. I remember weeks ago when I tried to escape through this exit. I didn’t realise that it led to the Wilderness. The cold makes me suck in my breath. He marches me down a path. Ahead, I recognise a stretch of Wilderness fence. Rice unlocks a gate in it, pushes me through and locks it behind me.

‘I’ll see you in two days,’ he says. ‘Or not.’

I won’t allow myself to plead with him. I keep my mouth closed and my face blank. He stalks back into the Academy and slams the door behind him. I notice there’s no handle on this side.

Complete silence descends. I turn around to survey the Wilderness. It’s frosty. Scrubby, white-tipped grass stretches away from me. In the distance to the right I can see the remains of a building. To the left there are some woods.

I take a deep breath of icy air and walk down the rough path trampled into the grass. I’m obviously not the first to be excluded. The icy grass squeaks as I swivel round to get my first real look at the Academy from the outside.

Unbelievable.

The building looks like something out of a fairy tale.

I’d imagined it as a hulk of steel and concrete, but it’s made of red brick and has a tiled roof. There are patterns in the bricks and ivy climbing the walls. Over to the right is a funny little clock tower. The whole place is sparkling with frost. I would never have guessed it looked like this from the stinking interior. They must have knocked down walls and dug into the ground to make all the echoing metal spaces inside. I feel nauseous thinking about what lies underneath this rosy surface. It’s like looking at a ripe apple, but knowing that just beneath the skin the whole thing is rotten right through.

The wind starts to pick up and a violent shiver goes through me. I’m only wearing the regulation shirt, jacket and trousers. I tuck my elbows into my sides and cup my hands over my mouth so I can blow on them. My head is spinning from what has happened in the last few minutes. I’m in the Wilderness. Kay told me that they sent Specials out here if they broke the rules, but I don’t think I ever quite believed it.

I try to push down my fear. I wonder how far the temperature drops at night. Rice is either going to find my body beaten to a pulp or frozen to death. I stamp my feet and pull myself together, but not before a little voice in my head whispers:
I bet you wouldn’t be the first
.

My first thought is that maybe I can sneak back into the Academy somehow. I follow the fence along to the left. Soon I can see the corner of the Academy. On the wall running away from me is a rusting fire escape descending from the top of the building to the bottom. I can’t see how you would get to it from the inside of the Academy. This whole place is badly designed. Anyway, it’s no use to me because I’m cut off by the fence which stretches as far as I can see, away to the left.

I plod back towards the gate where Rice threw me out and on past to see what’s there. This time the fence doesn’t stretch into the distance, it makes a corner. On the other side of the fence is a steep grassy bank. At the bottom I can see a metro line and beyond that, in the distance I can make out what I think is the business sector. I try to orientate myself. The accommodation block Wilson and I went to must be over to the right somewhere. If only I could get through this fence I could escape. I step a little closer. I can hear the hum of electricity coming off it. Unless I work out a way to get under or over the fence there’s no way I can get out.

A little further away from the Academy the ground dips and there’s a rubbish dump with a clump of bushes on the far side. Even in the cold air the rubbish stinks, so I give it a wide berth. Part of me wants to stay close to the Academy, but if I’m going to last two nights I’ve got to find some water. I decide to try the woods in the distance first, since they’ll provide me with some shelter from the wind too.

I hope that walking will warm me up, but even with my hands jammed under my armpits, I can’t feel my fingers, and my toes are even worse.

After a while, I look back at the Academy. It’s glowing in the sunlight. I turn away again and something catches my eye. Something dark and low in the grass. I jog towards it, my breath streaming out in great smoky plumes. It looks like a box. I hope that it’s made of something strong enough to shelter me from the wind. I haven’t eaten since breakfast and I’d like to rest. When I reach the box there’s something oddly familiar about its shape. It’s made of metal and it looks like a knocked-over locker. I walk round it to find an open side at the front.

It’s a feeding pod. What on earth would a feeding pod be doing out here? I crawl inside. It’s a relief to be out of the wind. Someone has covered the bottom of the pod with shreds of dried grass. I pick up a piece, but my fingers are so numb it slips between them. The grass is paper thin. It must have taken for ever to make a pile. I stretch out my aching legs and my boots touch something soft. I reach down and find a blanket. My insides drop. A shelter with a blanket in it must belong to someone. I’m too cold to care. I’ll have to borrow the blanket and rest for at least a while. But as I struggle to pull the blanket around me, I can’t help wondering what sort of person would live in a place like this?

And what will they do if they find me wrapped in their blanket?

I’m back in the factory block. I’m leaning over the balcony, looking down on Wilson’s twisted body. Suddenly he turns his head. I hear his neck cracking. He stares up at me, his eyes glowing. ‘What have you done to me?’ he says.

I wake up with a gasp and smack my head on the pod as I try to sit up. My face aches with cold. I must have been asleep for a while as night has fallen outside the pod. I rub away the ice on my eyelashes with the blanket. Wilson’s contorted face is swimming in my mind.
Wilson’s dead
, I think.
There’s nothing you can do now
. I lie back and curl myself up as tightly as I can. I wish I wasn’t alone. I wish Kay was here.

I freeze.

There’s someone out there. I hold my breath to listen. Someone or something is moving nearby. I lean forward and stare hard into the darkness. The frosty grass is lit up by moonlight, but I can’t see anything except the dark smudge of the woods in the distance. I lie completely still and strain my ears. I can hear my heart. Maybe it was an animal. I scan the open space in front of me again. I hold my body rigid. Nothing happens. I wait and listen; still nothing happens. I exhale slowly and start to relax my aching muscles.

Ting!

Something hits the back of the pod. There’s something behind me.
Get out into the open
, I think,
run for it
. But I don’t seem to be able to make myself move.

Ting!

Someone is throwing stones at the back of the pod. I struggle to release an arm; it feels numb and heavy as if it belongs to someone else. I pull clumsily at the blanket.

Ting!

I’m yanking at the material and pedalling my feet, but the blanket clings like seaweed.

Dumpf!

Something heavier hits the back of the pod. Something like a boot. My insides turn liquid. A wave of terror runs through me and for a second I close my eyes.
Come on
. I open my eyes.

Inches from my nose is a twisted and deformed face.

I scream.

It’s Wilson.

For a split second I think that he has no eyes. Then I realise that his head is upside down because he’s leaning over the pod from behind, looking in at me. My scream startles him and the head disappears. How can this be happening? He’s dead. I was sure he was dead. Am I still dreaming?

I clamber out of my shelter and to my feet. He’s there, on the other side of the pod. One eye is closed and droops at the corner. His nose is crooked. We stand in the cold looking at each other; except he doesn’t look at my face, he stares into the middle of my chest.

‘Wilson,’ I say, ‘you’re alive!’

‘Wilson, Philip, AEP score 92,’ he says without raising his eyes from my chest.

There’s something wrong. Not just the bashed-up face and the mangled arm. His voice. His eyes.

‘Wilson, what happened? How did you get here?’ I say.