“And they turned it into a weapon,” muttered Ade. “That’s Unity for you.”
“You had a family, right?” Bill asked, not caring if the question seemed abrupt. “What happened to them?”
“I…” Reilly’s sudden indecision tasted tart and sharp, like he couldn’t figure out the right response. “They were arrested and put in a camp. They... they died.”
“Jesus,” said Ade. “I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry too,” said Bill, fighting not to show his confusion and anger. Reilly was lying - which probably meant his family were still alive, whatever the resistance seemed to think.
Bill had never had a family of his own, and had no idea what he might be capable of in order to keep them safe. Perhaps he should have felt sorry for Reilly Burns. Perhaps.
Bill and Ade leaned on each other as they walked back to the hut, the others following a few steps behind. “Don’t tell Reilly about the escape,” Bill muttered.
Ade became suddenly tense. “Why?”
“He said his family are dead. They aren’t.”
“How do you…?”
“Believe me when I say he’s lying. Unity must have kept them alive, and now they’re using them to control Reilly. We’ve all heard stories of them doing the same thing to other people. We have to assume he’s a spy.”
“How can you be so damn sure?”
“The same way I always am.”
Later that evening, the first raid in months was carried out while the inmates were all getting their evening rations. When Bill and the others got back to their hut, they found their bunks pushed aside, their mattresses lying outside on the damp gravel.
Bill got down on his hands and knees and pressed his fingers against the floorboards that gave him access to the outside world. There was no sign they had been pulled up, no scent belonging to any of the guards. He closed his eyes in silent relief.
If Reilly had wondered what he was doing, pressing and sniffing at the floorboards, he didn’t ask. “It’s Hannegan,” said Bill, standing back up. “Everything’s been different since she arrived.”
If only he could figure out what it was she wanted.
Not long after they’d pushed the bunks back into place and dragged the mattresses back in, two guards came to escort Bill back to the main building. Inside, he scented several other inmates all waiting to be questioned. He was led past all of them and straight into Hannegan’s office.
“Mister Sharpe,” she said. “We searched your hut.”
He sat across from her, trying not to show how worried he was. “And?”
“We found nothing. But you interest me. The way you move around this camp, I could swear it’s like you can see.”
Bill chuckled to hide his nervousness. “Maybe you missed it, but your helmet made me blind. I can’t see a damn thing.”
“And yet we’ve had one or two reports of Senseless in other camps having their remaining senses extraordinarily heightened following their treatment. You can understand why that might be of great scientific interest.”
“I don’t see what it has to do with me.”
“I’ve interviewed half a dozen inmates who witnessed your assault on Mister O’Hare. It’s not the first time you’ve been seen acting precisely as if you were still sighted. As if you know exactly what’s going on around you regardless.”
As she spoke, Bill heard a drawer slide open, slowly, as if Hannegan was working hard to keep it as quiet as possible. He heard her feet move around the desk until she stood to one side of him.
Immediately he knew there was a gun to his head. He could picture its barrel hovering just an inch from his right ear.
“I have something in my hand, Mister Sharpe,” said Hannegan. There was a slight edge of strain in her voice, no doubt, he thought, from holding the heavy weapon level with his skull. “Can you tell me what it is?”
Bill willed himself not to move, but thinking was far easier than doing. He couldn’t ignore the thrill of alarm surging up his spine, or the shortness of his breath.
“I don’t know,” he said, his voice tight.
“I don’t believe you.”
He knew, just a moment before she did it, that she was going to shoot him. Instinct took over: he jerked away just as she squeezed the trigger, tumbling off his chair and onto the floor.
The breath rattled out of his throat in quick spasms. The gun had made a clicking sound and nothing more. “You tricked me.”
“You’ve been tricking the idiots running this camp for a lot longer,” said Hannegan. Her voice was colder now. “Go back to your hut and stay there until tomorrow morning.”
And then? he nearly asked, but he already knew the answer. Then they’d put him in the one small motorboat the camp authorities kept fuelled by the dockside and send him back to the mainland, to have his brain picked apart.
But he’d be long gone by then - and not a moment too soon.
They let him out on his own, without even a guard to guide him back to his hut. It felt like Hannegan was laughing at him.
“Jesus,” said Ade when he walked back in, “what the hell happened? You’re shaking like a leaf.”
“I need to talk to you,” said Bill, ignoring Owen and Reilly. “Alone.”
He led Ade back out into the chill evening air. He could easily imagine Reilly’s puzzled stare as they closed the door behind them.
