The Tower Page 4

  No response.

  “Hey, junior, you want some food? Come on, I’ll even let you eat with a sharpened spoon.” No response. Greener knew that the prisoners sometimes lay like that to look at the man below—intimidating, hateful stares that lasted all day. It wasn’t like Allander, he thought, but it wasn’t that unusual either. “All right,” he said. “Lie there and I’ll get you on the way up.”

  He pushed the big red button on the remote and the elevator’s gears clicked, lowering him another level. “Hey there, Cyprus, ya big inbreed you. Sorry I couldn’t bring you a distant cousin to enjoy, but how about a nice deep-fried fun loaf?”

  “I could have you killed the minute you step foot off this Tower, Greener.”

  “Well, Billy Ray—”

  “I told you, don’t you fuckin’ call me that.”

  “All right, Sir Cyprus. I’m sure you could have me killed, but unfortunately …” Greener surveyed the bleak steel walls around him. “Unfortunately, I don’t see a pay phone around here anywhere. Or a quarter.”

  Cyprus scowled and ran his palm over his chin. “And you’re not due for a parole hearing … ,” Greener said, checking his watch carefully, “for about two hundred and eighteen years.”

  “Two hundred seventeen, six months, and four days or else when the good Lord Jesus comes to free the Master Race. And he won’t be taking you along.”

  “Now that hurts. I’m sorry to say it, Cyprus, but you’re off my Christmas-card list.” Greener checked his sheet. “Love to shoot the shit with you all day, farm boy, but I gots some grits to deliver.” Smiling, he rode the elevator out of view.

  He grimaced at the thick odor surrounding Level Three. Mills was down on his haunches in the corner, his hands resting on the ground. Greener said nothing as he slid the loaf through the opening. He didn’t watch as Mills scurried over to it, but he could hear him start to eat.

  When he finally reached Level Two, Tommy was ready with a complaint.

  “Greener, you gotta listen to me. This food’s fuckin’ killing me. It’s hurting me, it really is. Cruel and unusual, eh? It’s bad for a man’s soul to eat like this. To eat this. Bring me one good meal. One plate of fusilli, sausage and tomato sauce with oregano and basil. I’ll make you a rich man. You know I can. One plate, Greener, one plate.”

  “I’m sorry, Tommy. Can’t do it. But I did specially prepare this loaf for you. Unfortunately, I cut off the tips of my fingers making it, but you’ll enjoy those, I’m sure. It’ll remind you of old times.”

  “You mameluke.” Tommy wrung his hands as he paced his cell. “It used to be you could bribe a guard. What happened, the Democrats back in office?”

  “Sorry, not allowed to tell you. Remember, the ‘no access to outside information’ rule?” Greener glanced over at Safran, who was staring through the bars. Dried blood from a recent nosebleed had crusted around his lips and down his lower cheek. “Well hello, my little beacon of sunshine. A pleasure as always. Today’s specials are—”

  “Food. The food. Give me to it.”

  “Well, a little pronoun confusion going on, but I think you’ve earned your loaf anyway for your charming display of social skills. Come on, guys, let’s give him a hand.”

  “Can you believe him, this guy here?” Tommy shook his head and gestured painfully at Safran as Greener clicked the button to lower the platform. “All the criminals in the world, I get stuck next to fucko over here.”

  The platform stopped on the first level and Greener unlocked Unit 1A, the main storage area. He grabbed a couple of slickers before swinging the door shut and relocking it.

  “Jesus Christ!” Greener yelled as the elevator rose. “For a bunch of fuckin’ criminals, you’d think one of you’d have a goddamn sense of humor.” He snickered to himself. “Mr. Greener, you’ve just won the chance to be a prison guard. Where are you going to go? Well, Bob, I think I’ll waste my life away in the Tower! That’s right, ceaseless fun for the whole family.”

  As he came up on Level Ten, he noticed the last loaf by his foot. “Oh yeah, Atlasia. You want this? Last call. Come on, I’m gonna eat it myself.”

  Allander still lay facedown by his unit door, not moving. Greener called up the Hole, “Hey, Hackett! Hackett!”

  There was no answer from above, just the rising wind sucking across the top of the Hole. He decided Hackett was probably leaning over the parapet, watching the waves crash against the stone.

  He reached the metal arm through the food slot and prodded Allander before jerking it back out. No movement. He looked for an indication of breathing in the rise and fall of Allander’s back, but there was nothing. He prodded him again. Finally, he relaxed, letting the arm come to a rest on Allander’s back. He turned and shouted up the Hole, “Hey, Hackett, I think we got a dead one!”

  The minute Greener’s eyes left him, Allander seized the end of the metal arm. By the time Greener turned back, Allander was poised like an alligator. He faced Greener, glowering in the darkness.

  “What the fu—”

  Allander yanked the end of the metal arm with incredible force, pulling Greener by the strap around his wrist. Greener stumbled forward, losing his balance. As he fell, the elevator control slipped from his left hand and slid across the platform through the food slot under Allander’s door. Allander gathered it with his hands like a hockey goalie embracing a puck.

  Greener struck his chin on the steel bars of the platform floor. He shook his head, trying to clear his vision. The prisoners in the cages around him, sensing that something extraordinary was happening, began to scream with excitement, thrashing against their doors. The tightly wrapped rain slickers rolled around the platform, bouncing off the unit bars.

  Allander clicked the big red button and the elevator started up. Greener hung doubled over the edge of the elevator as it left the Level Ten platform. He dug his hands at the elevator where it met his crotch, hoisting his body up briefly to orient himself. The last thing he saw was the rush of Level Eleven coming down behind his head. The powerful elevator rose quickly under his stomach as the eleventh level caught his lower back and severed him at the midsection. The air left him in a wet grunt.

  The upper part of Greener’s corpse fell to the Level Ten platform with a dull thud, landing in front of Unit 10A. Allander still lay on his stomach, a look of subtle amusement on his face. The twitching torso was splayed grotesquely behind its crooked neck, both of its arms outstretched worshipfully to Allander.

  “I know, my little friend, I know,” Allander purred as he managed to free the metal arm and pull it inside his cage.

  Glancing up, he noticed Greener’s keys dangling over the edge of the elevator, still attached to his pants. They swayed back and forth from what had formerly been Greener’s crotch and legs, which remained somewhere around Level Eleven. Allander clicked the bottom red button and giggled obscenely.

  Spade also noticed the keys, and he began moving madly around his cell as the elevator lowered, bringing them nearer and nearer.

  “Atlasia. You forget that shit I said. You forget it. You let me out of here. You let me the fuck out when you get ahold of those keys. Don’t you leave me caged up in here.”

  Allander ignored him and reached for the keys with the metal arm, which he had been holding reverently. The pronged end of the arm caught the ring easily. As he backed it away, the chain slid out of Greener’s gory midsection.

  Even the prisoners who could not see Greener’s corpse had joined the clamor. Ironically, Claude Rivers, the only one with a good vantage point of what was happening, was dozing away in his cot.

  “Hey, Greener, you all right down there? Move your ass, it’s starting to rain and we gotta get the Hatch sealed.” Hackett’s voice echoed down the Hole.

  Allander tensed up and the metal arm struck the top of his food slot. The keys lost their hold on the end of the arm and fell to the platform. They barely caught, dangling halfway over one of the flat steel bars.

  “You promise. You
give me your word you’ll let me go when you get that bitch or I’ll yell like a beast to high heaven.”

  “Interesting simile,” Allander hissed.

  “What the fuck’s keepin’ you?” Hackett bellowed from above. “You throwin’ a party, or what?” Because it was dusk and a storm was coming in, it was too dark for him to see down the Hole.

  “I’m not joking here,” Spade growled. “I’ll fuck you.”

  “Sounds ravishing,” Allander said dryly.

  The other inmates moved frantically about their units, trying to figure out what, exactly, had happened.

  Leaning against the Hatch, Hackett heard only the crash of the waves against the side of the Tower and the noise of the stirring prisoners. He gazed up at the dark clouds gliding ominously through the sky.

  “Must’ve dropped a fuckin’ loaf down the Hole,” he said, settling back against the railing and lighting up another cigarette.

  Spade cringed as Allander reached for the keys with the arm. “Come on, Atlasia. You got this. You got this now.”

  Allander struck the keys with the metal arm, but he missed the ring, and they shifted dangerously on the edge.

  “You motherfucker! You gotta be careful.”

  “Your perception of the obvious is admirable.” Allander stabbed at the keys again, this time hooking the ring with the prong. Slowly, he brought the arm back, moving it hand over hand until the keys dangled just outside the bars.

  They were right before him, just out of reach. He lowered the tilt of the arm and pulled it back sharply. The keys flew through the bars to his hand. Allander gazed at them affectionately for a moment, overwhelmed at all they represented. They glittered in the darkness.

  Rising to his feet, Allander reached the keys through his door to the lock. On the way through, they struck the side of one of the bars and slid from his sweaty palm. He crouched and shot his other hand through the food slot, grabbing the keys just before they disappeared through the bars of the platform floor.

  Spade let out a gentle moan.

  “It’s hard not to be in control, isn’t it, Spade? Frustrating not to be in the driver’s seat?” His hand tight around the keys, Allander gestured as though he were holding a steering wheel. He pretended to lose his grip on the keys again, and Spade fell to his knees with a bang, arms uselessly outstretched. Allander caught the keys easily with a sweep of his other hand.

  He laughed at Spade’s expression as he inserted the key. The gears in the lock clicked loudly. He pushed the door and it swung open, creaking at the hinges. It was the first time a unit door had been opened from the inside. Only the dead had ever left the cells.

  “Now open me. Free me.” Spade reached for him, his fingers grasping at the black space in front of him.

  Allander stepped onto the elevator platform and crossed the Hole, holding the keys inches from Spade’s reach. Spade strained forward, turning his head and pressing his cheek to the bars.

  “How much does all that exquisite muscle help you now, Spade? I’d bet that if your shoulders were a touch less beefy you could reach … the … extra … inch … to … the … keys.” He swung them back and forth in front of Spade.

  “You hand those. You hand them here, you motherfucker, or I’ll yell. I’ll yell my fucking lungs out.”

  “Calm yourself.” Allander laid a long, bony finger over his lips. “I’m going to dispose of the final nuisance above and the last thing I need is to be struck on the head by one of your wayward muscles. I’ll see to you after I’ve handled him.” He motioned upward with a flick of his head.

  “Bullshit!”

  “Ssh.”

  “Fuck you, ssh! Why the hell should I believe you?”

  “Because what choice have you got?”

  “I could fuckin’ scream—how’s that for a choice?”

  “Fine,” Allander said loudly. Spade cringed, looking up the Hole. Allander crossed his arms, strumming his fingers. “Let’s hear it.”

  Spade turned in a tight circle, then grabbed the bars, his chest rising as if he was going to yell. But he didn’t. After a moment of silence, Allander placed the keys on the elevator platform by his feet. Then he stepped forward and extended his hand to Spade’s unit. Spade saw that the keys were out of Allander’s reach, and he cursed silently.

  They gripped hands firmly around the thumbs, and Allander leaned forward, peering intently into his eyes. “I will free you,” he said. “You have my word.”

  He clicked the top red button with his other hand, and the elevator whirred and began to rise. Spade held Allander’s hand until it slipped up out of reach. Then he began to pace.

  8

  HACKETT heard the elevator engage. “About fuckin’ time,” he muttered, and peered over the edge. He saw a mound in the center of the elevator, covered with a blue jail-issue blanket.

  “Oh shit, Mary Mother of God.” His gun was immediately out, aiming at the mound as he fumbled for his walkie-talkie.

  “Come in, goddamnit. Come in now. Over.” But the thunder brewing in the sky had given way to a rain shower, broken now and then by bolts of lightning. The reception on the handset was shot, and only static poured out.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck!” Hackett smashed the walkie-talkie on the railing. He looked longingly at the emergency phone on the wall of the shed, but then he glanced back down at the rapidly rising elevator and knew there was no time. He couldn’t even check the location sensors to see which prisoner was on the loose.

  His gun stayed fixed on the rising blue pile, which became clearer as the scant light from the sky spilled over it. Rather than rising to its usual perch ten feet in the air above the Hole, the platform clicked to a stop barely two feet above the top of the shaft.

  Hackett fought to keep his hand from shaking. “Come out. Uncover yourself now! There are three of us up here and we have you surrounded.”

  Silence.

  He advanced to the elevator, then stepped up onto it, his eyes locked on the blue blanket. His footsteps were measured and steady as he crept silently forward. The rain fell gently across his face, and he felt drops moving down his neck and mingling with the sweat on his back.

  Behind him, an arm slid, spiderlike, out from the two-foot gap under the elevator, and Allander’s head emerged after it. Allander strained to pull himself out from where he hung on the crossing support bars beneath the elevator. He managed to roll silently through the gap to the top of the Tower.

  Hackett approached the blanket. His left hand inched forward, still shaking, as he held the gun steady in his right. He yanked the blanket back, revealing Greener’s lower body. “Oh my God,” he gasped.

  Behind him, Allander pulled himself silently to his feet. Hackett started to whirl around but Allander ducked and swept his feet with a glancing kick, pulling the guard’s legs out from under him. Hackett hit the ground flat on his back, banging his head.

  Before he could raise his gun, Allander was in the air above him. He landed with the point of his knee squarely on Hackett’s neck, collapsing his windpipe. Hackett twitched twice, then was still. His arms fell to his sides, the gun snug in his hand even as it clicked to rest against the metal.

  Allander smiled. “I guess it’s true. A veteran doesn’t relinquish his weapon.” He pried the gun from Hackett’s grip and set it down beside him.

  Then he paused and looked down tenderly at the fallen man. Reaching forward, he hugged him around the chest and neck, curling up on him momentarily as if to draw warmth from him. Hackett’s head bobbed in the embrace, his blank eyes gazing ahead. After a moment, Allander got up and raised the elevator to its resting position ten feet above the Hatch.

  Spade spied Allander’s dark figure silhouetted at the top of the Hole. “Come on now, Atlasia. Your word. I have your word,” he cried, his voice pleading now.

  “Indeed. I said I’d free you, and I will. You just have to be less … literal.”

  Allander smiled as he extended his arm over the Hole and opened his fist. The
keys fell from it, rotating end over end as they plummeted into the darkness.

  Spade roared below him, reaching desperately through the door at the keys, his fingers splayed, his shoulder and cheek mashed against the bars. The keys brushed his fingertips as they passed and he screamed as he saw them disappear below.

  Allander looked at his hand, feigning shock. “Whoops.”

  “YOU MOTHERFUCKER. YOU SENSELESS MOTHERFUCKER!”

  “Well, at least my actions have prodded you to use a two-syllable word.”

  “I’LL FUCKIN’ R—”

  “YOU’LL WHAT?” Allander yelled, crouched intently over the Hole, the veins in his neck bulging with blood. Spade halted mid-sentence, shocked by the rage in Allander’s voice. “You’ll what? I apologize, I didn’t quite catch that. Somehow, I’m failing to see the danger in your threats.” He leaned forward and gazed into the Hole. “I couldn’t even retrieve those keys now if I wanted to. And I certainly don’t want to.”

  The prisoners below Spade recognized Allander’s voice, and peered up the dark shaft. The Tower erupted with noise, like a madhouse on the evening of a full moon. Despite the clamor, Claude Rivers slept on in Unit 11A. Spade strained to shout at Allander above the din, but realizing he could no longer be heard, gave up and settled heavily on his bed. His head collapsed into his open hands as he tried to shut out the insanity.

  Allander roamed around the top of the Tower, laughing at the submachine guns hanging limply in the shed and digging through Hackett’s tool kit. He pulled out a pair of wire cutters. The rain had momentarily stopped, as if gathering strength for a larger downpour.

  Running over to the top of the Hole, Allander lowered the elevator and rolled Hackett’s body off before raising the elevator again. Then he kicked the sprawled corpse over to the Hole, where it dangled over the edge. He laughed, and uttered a brief introduction. “Hackett, the Hole. Hole, this is Hackett.”

  Placing his foot firmly on Hackett’s behind, he shoved once and the body fell over the side and dropped into the void. It landed with a loud thud at the bottom, where it lay like a discarded marionette.