He decided to risk it.
Locked.
Fuck!
He clicked the gun at it which failed to do anything except pass the time.
He kicked the lock, then hopped around on one foot for a few moments, cradling the foot in his hands.
‘Oh….ouch…’ he gasped.
The pain subsided enough to try another tack.
He placed the injured foot on the floor, backed up a little for the run-up, took a deep breath, and charged, right shoulder first.
***
‘This is getting boring,’ said the man, raising his eyebrows as he watched the screens.
On one, Donnie rolled around on the floor for a while, swearing and holding his shoulder in a vain attempt to make the pain go away.
‘We’ve waited this long,’ said the woman. ‘A few moments more isn’t going to break the bank is it?’
He turned to her.
‘That’s a mixed metaphor.’
‘Hmmm?’ she smiled as she turned her head.
* * *
‘Open goddamn it!’ yelled Donnie.
If wishes were horses, this one would have left enough manure for a market garden.
The door opened and a familiar face stepped out, the accompanying body dressed in bright orange overalls.
‘You!’
‘Me?’ said Donnie.
‘You bastard! You hit me!’
The man grabbed Donnie by the shoulders and pushed him across the hallway, terminating against the opposite wall.
‘Who are—Harold,’ Donnie exclaimed.
‘Yes, Harold,’ said Harold, bruised over one eye and extremely pissed-off.
‘Harold the gimp,’ said Donnie with surprise. This was a turn-up for the books.
‘That really fucking hurt,’ said Harold angrily. ‘And I missed out on my bonus. You owe me a mask too.’
‘Ah. Well, I can explain.’
‘And do you know how hard it is to explain bruises like this?’
Donnie grinned sheepishly.
‘Now it’s my turn,’ said Harold darkly.
Harold removed a hand from Donnie’s shoulder, clenched a fist and pulled back to hit Donnie with it.
One shoulder free, Donnie twisted toward Harold just quickly enough to avoid the fast-approaching appendage. Harold’s fist hit the aluminum wall with a clang!
Donnie twisted further, gripping Harold’s other hand. Neither man was used to fighting; they overbalanced, and toppled over to the floor.
The two men rolled around, Donnie on top – then not – then on top once more. The struggle was hardly one that would have ended up in an action movie starring muscle-bound heroes. A slapstick comedy from the 1920′s perhaps, but certainly not a Hollywood punch-on.
Harold managed to get into a position which would have been extremely compromising had Donnie been Daisy.
He looked down at Donnie with a triumphant expression.
‘Finally,’ he said. ‘I am so pissed-off!’
‘I can understand that,’ said Donnie, well and truly pinned.
‘I had information for you,’ yelled Harold. ‘I was sworn to deliver it. The location of the main CCT base–’
‘Right here,’ said Donnie. ‘I’ve worked it out.’
Harold scowled angrily, then his expression became one of worry. He looked up.
Donnie craned backwards and saw a pair of wet shoes inside which were a pair of scratched and bleeding legs. The pantyhose had seen better days.
Tina lashed out and kicked Harold’s face viciously. His head snapped back and he fell, unconscious onto Donnie.
‘Get up,’ said Tina in a voice that could only have been described as pissed-off.
Donnie pushed Harold off of himself and did as he was told.
‘That looks like it hurts,’ said Donnie, with mock concern about Tina’s injuries. He pointed to his own face. ‘There’s a doctor down there if you’re interested. She’s great with a needle.’
‘Open it,’ she said, indicating the door which Donnie had been trying to use.
‘Can’t,’ said Donnie matter-of-factly. ‘He’s got the card.’
She gave him a look which communicated all that was required, then for the sake of clarity, vocalised her feelings.
‘Get the card or I’m going to use your head to open the door,’ she hissed.
Donnie retrieved then swiped Harold’s card in the lock. The door clicked open.
The door led to a metal gantry, across a vast warehouse-like luggage processing area.
‘You first,’ she said.
‘Thought you’d say that,’ he said with a worried tone. He side-stepped through the doorway, keeping his eyes on her.
As the door slammed shut, Tina shoved him viciously and he stumbled forwards and down onto the metal framework of the gantry.
Beneath the structure was a conveyor belt which carried luggage from one end of the area to the other.
Tina knelt on Donnie’s back and grabbed his head, lifted, and slammed it down hard.
‘Ow! Fuck,’ Donnie exclaimed.
He twisted and tried to dislodge her.
Tina overbalanced enough for Donnie to wriggle free. He tried to stand, but was tripped again.
She pushed him down and dug her fingernails into his neck.
Donnie elbowed backwards, and the random blow smacked hard into Tina’s hip.
They rolled away from one-another, clutching the parts of their bodies that screamed painfully.
Donnie got to his feet, just beating Tina. He ran along the gantry, cradling his elbow. Tina followed, limping slightly.
‘Come back you fucking bastard!’ she yelled after him.
‘Not on your life,’ he yelled back, then fell forwards in response to something hitting his head.
The shoe clanked down on the metal behind him.
Tina was on him again, now pushing him under the guard-rail. She slapped at his hands as he tried in desperation to prevent himself falling.
‘What’s your problem,’ he pleaded, now hanging on with only one hand. ‘I’ve never done anything to you!’
‘Your kind have kept women down for thousands of years! Now it’s time for payback!’
Great.
She slapped his remaining hand hard enough, and with a yelp of pain, flipped in mid-air and landed upon a well-stuffed bag moving along the conveyor belt.
‘Oh, shit,’ he said, raising his head. The conveyor terminated only twenty meters ahead and beyond that came the sounds of something unpleasantly mechanical.
Thumpa-Thumpa-Thumpa!
‘Bye, bye,’ yelled Tina triumphantly.
Donnie stood unsteadily and glanced upwards. There was no way he could get back onto the bridge.
The conveyer belt led into a large metal machine. Donnie ducked down and peered inside.
Hammers and mangles did to the luggage what only the most cynical traveller had hitherto only suspected.
* * *
‘Now perhaps,’ asked the man.
‘He’s got no way out this time.’
The boy began to cry.
* * *
Donnie ran back along the belt, tripping on bags big and small as he went. He abandoned the idea of avoiding them – what was the point anyway – and ran on top of them instead.
* * *
The Cubists rolled their eyes and cradled their heads for a moment in frustration.
The woman stood. ‘I know where he’s going.’
‘Take care,’ said her brother.
She reached into the play-pen and picked-up her son, comforting him while surreptitiously checking his nappy.
‘You’ll be okay with him,’ she asked her brother. ‘I don’t think he’ll need a change for a while.’
* * *
Donnie slid down a side-belt on his backside, bumping past caged animals which were speeding toward another machine. This one made an awful screaming sound and shook like a paint-mixing machine.
At the bottom, he rolled off onto terra-firma on his hands and knees beside the main machine and a small open-topped monorail car, on a rail that led back into the building.
He got back to his feet and ran past a man sitting at a desk marked ‘Quality Control’.
The man ignored Donnie’s passing, concentrating instead on stuffing a big bag of vegetable matter into a suitcase. He reached out for a large knife and slashed, in a bored fashion, at another.
Donnie crashed through the plastic doors and sprinted down another corridor. Soon he emerged again on the tarmac.
Glancing upwards to make sure he wasn’t about to be turned into swiss export-quality fromage, he spied a plane slowly coming into the terminal. It stopped and the door opened.
Marcus climbed out, glanced around and spied Donnie who jogged towards the now stationary plane standing there like a very big white tube with wings.
‘Where are the others,’ asked Marcus.
At the edge of his hearing, Donnie heard a hollow sound and yelped in pain. He pulled a needle from his neck.
‘Oh shit…’ he collapsed.
* * *
Fuzzy light entered Donnie’s eyes. It increased as his eyes opened fully.
‘Whuhhhhh?’ he murmured. ‘Where…?’
The room was dark other than the spotlights which were trained upon his prone body.
He glanced around just as a man stepped forward from the darkness beyond.
‘You are perfectly safe,’ said the man.
‘And that would be because I’m stuck to a table,’ said Donnie with a little sarcasm. ‘So I can’t go anywhere I can get hurt?’
The man smiled. ‘Quite.’
‘Who’re you.’
‘Pardon me for not introducing myself,’ said the man. ‘I am Monsieur Bleu.’
‘And I am Madame Pink,’ said a woman walking forwards from the darkness.
‘The needle slinger.’
She smiled cryptically.
‘What’s going on,’ asked Donnie, for what felt like the thousandth time that day.
‘It is quite simple, Mister Penfolde,’ said Monsieur Bleu.
‘Is it? Oh, that’s good to know,’ replied Donnie with more sarcasm. ‘Pardon me, but I’ve heard that before and it’s never the case.’
They stared without saying a word. The silence became a little unnerving.
‘There’s no running away and instant death around the next corner is there,’ Donnie asked in a more conciliatory tone. These nutters had him in a very prone position. It wouldn’t hurt to try to be more polite.
‘That depends on whether you’re able to release yourself from these bonds in time,’ said Madame Pink.
She smiled cruelly.
Donnie craned his neck upwards and regarded the bonds. Metal manacles held his arms fast to the steel platform. Similar bonds held his ankles.
‘If you will look toward the ceiling,’ said Monsieur Bleu, ‘you will see a nice little device that you will find in most Compact Disc players.’
‘Ours is of a slightly better quality,’ continued Madame Pink, then added, ‘and intensity.’
To prove the point, a beam burst to life, slowly cutting through the platform between Donnie’s legs.
‘Now just– just hang on a minute,’ said Donnie watching the blue beam with eyes wide with surprise and fear. He began to yank at the manacles that held his hands.
‘What do you want from me,’ pleaded Donnie.
Madame Pink and Monsieur Bleu smiled enigmatically.
‘We are Cubists,’ said Monsieur Bleu. ‘We see things from all different points of view.’
‘Like you,’ said Madame Pink.
They stepped back and watched him from a discreet distance. Donnie could only make-out the shape of their bodies at the edge of the darkness; their faces were obscured.
The beam continued its path up toward Donnie’s body. He briefly wondered if one of the manacles wasn’t quite as well fastened as it could be. He pulled hard on it.
The smell of white-hot metal was sharp in his nostrils.
‘You expect me to talk,’ yelled Donnie, glancing up in panic at the manacle once more, then down at the beam.
‘No, Mister Penfolde,’ said Madame Pink.
Donnie gasped as he finally managed to free a hand, bloodied but intact.
Blue-arcing electricity burst to life, separating Donnie and the table from the rest of the room.
Donnie looked downwards and watched as the beam slowly tracked the last few inches towards his body.
‘Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck…’ said Donnie, and reached downwards.
BZORNT!
He woke with a killer headache and instinctively felt between his legs.
He found something unexpected.
He checked once more.
What?
Daisy-Donnie slowly opened their eyes, and saw a familiar device above their head. The beam of light stopped, as did the crackle of electricity around them.
The manacles holding one arm and their legs clicked open.
Daisy-Donnie sat up slowly, cradling their raw and bleeding hand with the other. They breathed shallowly, and their eyes darted here and there in considerable confusion. They blinked much faster than a normal person would.
Madame Pink and Monsieur Bleu stood just outside the circles of light and in partial shadow.
They glanced at each other and embraced.
‘We’ve done it,’ said Madame Pink.
Click to see the next installment: Pornography (part 1)
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