Xion Island Zero: Chapter 33

Alan wakes up. He’s missed the best part, which I think is ungrateful of him. I need to poke him, or worse, but I don’t want him to leave me again. How pathetic is that? I’m enjoying spending time with dear old dad. He’s staring at me. I don’t like the look. He manifests defiance. Even now. After everything he’s done to me. I don’t get it. So I punish him by ripping the strong silver tape from his face, taking some beard and skin with it. It leaves a raw graze that blinks at me with filling pink capillaries. It’s satisfying. I don’t like his insolence. I call the shots. He makes a sound in his throat, and I think he’s laughing—my mistake, he’s choking. Is that what that pained noise is? ‘What’s the matter with you?’

‘Nobody will listen to that bullshit,’ Alan says. ‘They’ll think you’re insane.’

I kneel beside him and pull a folded paper from my pocket.

‘They released a statement today. Do you want to hear what that officer said?’

‘No.’

He’s testing my patience. I read it anyway. ‘DCI Nash has this to say, “We believe the suspect is operating under delusions and probable mental illness. He poses a credible risk to the public. Travis Bernstein should not be approached. He is unstable and dangerous. We are working tirelessly to bring him into custody, but ask everybody to remain vigilant.”‘

I pause and look up.

‘Delusional,’ I repeat, reading on.

‘”We urge the suspect to come forward. There is a window for resolution. No further lives need be lost.” Who does he think he is? Your friend, the inspector, is the delusional one.’ I crumple the sheet of paper, wishing it could be Nash’s head. ‘He thinks this pantomime will work. How can he believe I’m stupid enough to be drawn out by insulting my character? It will run its course just as planned. They don’t realise that I had every step in place before they even knew my name.’

I lean in and put my face inches from Alan’s. I want to spit a wad of bile in it, but Susan Bernstein brought me up better than that. I have manners that were taught to me by people better than the Taylor tribe, so I resist the notion.

‘Nash is taunting me to flush me out. I even get his ridiculous double-bluff. He knows I’m more intelligent than twenty of them and that I’ll see through his ruse in a second. But he’s banking on me coming anyway, for my ego, and the sport of it. He knows I can outwit them. But here’s the thing, Alan. I enjoy being hunted. It’s written in my manifesto, all part of the plan. It makes the ending more poetic. So guess what?’ He doesn’t reply, so I punch him and move on. ‘I’ll take his double bluff and raise it to my triple. I’m going to visit him at home. He won’t expect that.’

Alan coughs and looks away. ‘You’re broken.’

‘Me? I’m broken? Then you should have stuck around long enough to drop-kick me into a bucket.’

He turns his face to the wall. I allow it. He’ll face me when I need him to, but for now, I pace. The chain and padlock gleam on the crate in the corner. I pick them up and test their weight in my hand. Like me, they’re sturdy and reliable.

I circle him, and he flinches when I get too close. I play with him for a while and then move in fast, using my knife to hack chunks out of his hair and scalp. He screams at me and hurls language that I’m sure his papa never taught him.

‘Everyone’s a critic. So I never trained as a stylist. You should have paid my way through college, Dad.’

‘Go to hell.’

‘If only I could. It would be my kind of place. I spent years looking through a children’s home window for you. But you never came.’

‘I didn’t know how to find you,’ he says.

‘Liar. Wrong answer.’ I pour the bucket he’s been toileting in over his head and watch him splutter. It stinks, and his humiliation is funny, but it isn’t enough. I refill it from a four-gallon container and douse him in clean water. It’s more for my benefit than his. I might need to touch him. 

Unzipping a leather case, I choose a scalpel. Alan watches me like a terrified bird. He stiffens.

‘Relax.’ I run the tip across the top of his hand, breaking skin. ‘I’m not here to end you today. But you need some perspective.’

He tenses when I jab it into his thigh. It’s a flesh wound, nothing fatal. But it will bleed and remind him that he made me.

Before I go, I put him in the crate so he can’t escape. I make him lean against the bars, and I bind him to them. Kneeling, I check the knots, and the ghosts of those Boy Scout years come back to me. The rope is tight, but I cinch it anyway. I reinforce the gag with fresh duct tape. I can’t have him slipping free, or yelling, and I allow him just enough circulation to keep him conscious.

‘Don’t go anywhere,’ I tell him.

I step into the darkness and leave him to his thoughts.

And at the forest edge, I pull out my burner and compose a message. It’s brief.

You want me, darling? I’m yours, xxx.

To DCI Nash.

I press send.