At 2:00 am the station room door was once again opened, this time causing Vicky to lift her head. Both she and Jill, watched as a middle aged woman walked over to Mr Rob, who, immediately on seeing her, stood. She was like everyone else they’d seen there so far, tall. She had a medium build with long blonde, unkempt hair. Her face looked fairly smooth, with only a few faint lines, which made her look fifty-five to sixty; although Jill got the impression she could be much older. She wore a grey, short-sleeved floral patterned dress reaching down to her ankles, and her eyes looked the same as his, dark, deep-red, and cold. She was standing behind Mr Rob, and both were facing the cells.
Jill and Vicky looked at each other, and then back at the woman, who, without making any noise of movement, was now standing just outside the cell door. She pushed her face through the bars and started sniffing at Jill and Vicky like an inquisitive Terrier. Jill hadn’t heard the woman moving across the floor, of that, she was certain.
‘Sniff, sniff. This one will be ready for breeding soon,’ she said, indicating with her head to Vicky. Her voice was deep, almost masculine.
After hearing this, Jill and Vicky looked at each other again, this time, in absolute and utter disbelief. The woman looked closely at Vicky’s swollen face then thundered back to the desk, and Mr Rob.
Vicky shouted. ‘What the fuck was that supposed to mean? Hey you ... bitch!’
But the woman never responded. She stood facing Mr Rob, almost nose to nose, then, moving her right hand to her left shoulder, she struck him across his scarred right cheek. ‘What good will they be if you keep fucking them up?’ she shouted.
Jill and Vicky stood at the bars doing a bit of shouting of their own. Nothing they’d heard or seen in the last couple of minutes had eased their anguish in the slightest.
‘What the fuck is up with you people?’ shouted Vicky.
Jill gripped the bars with both hands. ‘Let us out of here you fucking freaks!’
‘Hey, fuck face!’ Vicky spat at the woman but missed.
Mr Rob peered over the woman’s shoulder as she turned to look at them. ‘Be still,’ she shouted. ‘If you need anything, Hal here will get it for you.’
Jill shouted back. ‘What we need is for you to open this fucking cage and let us the fuck out of here!’
‘That, unfortunately for you, is out of the question,’ she replied, then looked in the adjoining cell. ‘How long before he restores?’ she said to Hal.
Hal looked at the clock on the wall above the washroom. ‘Within the next thirty minutes, give or take a-’
‘Okay then, get him strapped to the floor and open the hatch. It’ll rain soon, and this time,’ she said, nearing her face to his. ‘I don’t want any fuck-ups! You got that?’
Hal nodded. ‘Yes, Ella.’
‘When you’re done, get yourself over to the town hall, we’ll wait out the storm and clean up this whole mess tomorrow.’
‘Hey, why the fuck won’t you listen to us?’ Jill shouted .
Ella turned looking at them both again, and in the cold meaningful wake of her stare, they ceased shouting. ‘The blonde could be very precious to us, see to it she comes to no more harm.’ She then started out the door.
‘... and the other one, Ella?’ he said, anticipating something she’d obviously forgot to mention.
Ella paused just outside before she answered. ‘Take her to Chambers and hook her up. And if it rains before you get finished, use the tunnel.’ She then left.
As the shouting got them nowhere, Jill tried another tactic. ‘Gee Hal; boss lady sure slapped your ass.’
Hal closed the door before sitting back at his desk and said nothing in reply. He turned the shoe box over emptying out the remaining contents. A fuel receipt, a road map of North Carolina, and a pair of worn sneakers, all of which, he scooped into the waste bin under his desk.
Vicky joined in the abuse. ‘Hey, Hal, was that yo’ mamma? Ma’an she’s almost as ugly as you are.’
But there was still no reply from Hal.
Another twig-snap came from the cell next to theirs, and again Jill looked round, this time, so did Vicky. They both stared at the body, watching as it began to twitch, first one leg, then the other. Each time, the crack of bone echoed in the small room.
The girls backed up.
‘Hey, Vicky, those legs ... they were broken right? I mean, they were weren’t they?’ The legs Jill spoke of, were now straight and looked quite normal.
‘Yeah, what the fuck’s going on here, Jill?’
Jill shook her head. ‘Some real weird shit, he should be dead, right?’
Hal picked up the keys from his desk opening the other cell door. ‘It’ll take more to kill a Lifer than what you two did.’
Jill frowned. ‘A lifer? You mean he was an escaped convict?’
‘No, he’s my fuckin’ boyfriend, who I’m about to throw a shower for, and guess what? You two are invited to watch him bathe ... aha ha!’ Hal’s play on words seemed to amuse only himself.
The girls looked on as he pulled the leather jacket from off the man’s back, and the black T-shirt from beneath. He then spread-eagled him out on the floor closing and locking the four shackles around each of his limbs.
Jill couldn’t believe what she was seeing. ‘What the fuck are you doing to him?’
‘It’s time this fucker was cleansed.’
‘Cleansed? He’s alive. He needs a doctor, not a fucking spiritualist.’
‘He’s no more alive than the rest of us, not countin’ you two o’ course.’
When Hal finished shackling the man to the floor, he reached up unfastening the bolts holding the hatch shut, and for a minute he stared out looking at the clouds above.
‘What’s that for?’ asked Jill.
‘You’ll see,’ he said, then locked the door after leaving the cell.
Jill stood looking at the man, he wasn’t conscious, but he was definitely alive.
Vicky moved over to their cell door. ‘Hey, crater-face, what did that bitch mean when she said I’ll be ready for breeding soon?’
Hal sat with his elbows on the desk and his broad, square chin, resting on his closed fists. ‘Well little lady,’ he began. ‘Seein’ as you’re clean, and by that I mean a virgin. You’re just what we need right now. Fresh meat you might say.’
Jill saw Vicky flick her a look, she had no idea Vicky was still a virgin, she knew she hadn’t had many boyfriends, but they talked about everything together, didn’t they? Under normal circumstances she’d definitely want to talk about this one, but right now, and right there, just wasn’t the time or place for that. She’d have it out later. If there ever was a later.
‘None of you will ever get near me.’ Vicky shouted.
‘Hah ... is that right?’ laughed Hal. ‘What’re you gonna do, refuse?’
‘No, I’ll-’
‘Vicky wait.’ Jill held a finger to her lips then started to whisper. ‘Remember what you said earlier, about us not coming out of this alive?’
‘Yeah,’
‘Well you may be right.’
‘What?’
‘Shh, keep your voice down.’
‘Sorry, what?’
‘Listening to what he just said, if we don’t do something to get out soon, we might never get out.’
‘Do what, Jill? Ask him for the keys?’
‘We have to get him in here.’
‘Fuck that! You said not to-’
‘I know what I said, Vicky. But right now we don’t have much of a choice.’
‘Okay, say he comes in here. What then?’
‘One of us distracts him, and the other gets his gun from the desk.’
Vicky looked over Jill’s shoulder to see Hal’s gun lying there. ‘Then what, we shoot the fucker? Ooo, I like that.’
‘No, we don’t shoot him, someone might hear the gun and we’ll get them all in here then. We threaten him with it, take his car, and get the fuck away from this place.’
‘I like that too, but how do we get him in here in the first place?’
‘Remember what the ugly bitch said, just before she left?’
‘Yeah, she said something about a tunnel.’
‘No, not that, she said ... “See to it she comes to no more harm.” Meaning you!’
‘Yeah you’re right, she did.’
‘Well then, here’s what we have to do ...’
*
After hearing raised voices, Hal looked up to see his two prisoners rolling around the cell floor and pulling at one another’s hair whilst screaming blue murder. He shot to his feet that fast he shunted the desk forward a couple of feet with his knees.
‘What the fuck are ya doin’?’ he yelled. But the girls continued to battle it out.
He picked up the cattle-prod and the keys and opened the door, but rushing in as he did, he left the keys in the lock. He wanted to stick them both, if only to separate them, but he couldn’t harm the blonde any more. He'd been told, and that was enough.
‘You bitch! You fucking bitch!’ cried the blonde, pulling at a fistful of hair.
‘You’re the bitch, you fucking virgin cow!’
‘Stop fuckin’ around, now!’ he shouted. But they both carried on rolling about the floor screaming obscenities. ‘Aw, fuck this!’ he said, sticking the prod between them.
After a one second jolt, the two girls immediately separated, and Hal tossed the cattle-prod to the floor where it rolled under the bench. Then, using both hands, he gripped the dark-haired one by the throat and began to tighten his grip.
*
Vicky started to recover from her share of the prod, but her mind was muggy. There was something she had to do. Something she had to get. Something she ... the cop’s gun. That was it. Get the cop’s gun and shoot the fucker. But Jill was in the doorway, and that cop was on her like a raging bull on a novice matador, and with both his hands around her neck. There was no way she could get past them.
With very little time to think, and very few options to think about, she jumped on the cop’s back and started clawing at his face. Then she felt a hand pulling at her hair; she tried her best to hold on by gripping tight on both his ears, but before the mandatory eight seconds were over, the rodeo ride ended.
Vicky hit the floor landing against the bars on the far side of the cell. The look she saw on the cop’s face showed the rage he was putting into his hold on Jill. And whilst he throttled the life out of her best friend, she could only watch, totally unable to do anything to help.
