Hurricane Heart

Arjan

Downstairs was the same sort of idea as the place we went to in Germany, only it opened up into a slightly more homely living space. I found a light switch after a few minutes searching the dark walls, and it flickered on to reveal some sofas and chairs and a TV, and a lot of advanced looking computers and other electrical devices. On the far side of the room was a small gallery kitchen area, a little dated and minimal in its appliances, but still with an oven, fridge, freezer and a microwave amongst worktop surfaces.

There were a few doors; two on the left and two on the right, and I was just about to test them when I heard Hurricane coming down. Shame...I’d had no chance to find the guns and grenades and fighting equipment that I knew they’d had in the last place.

She got to the bottom but did not seem to acknowledge me. That was, until she grabbed me by the arm and began to drag me off.

So she still didn’t really trust me at all then.

She pushed open the furthest door on the left.

‘Bathroom,’ she muttered, indicating the slightly grimy, tiled room. The next door revealed a room unlike any in the last place.

‘This is the sleeping area,’ she announced briskly, gesturing inside. Shining her torch in—I assumed the lights didn’t work too well in there or something—revealed many identical bunk beds lined along the left hand wall—enough to sleep ten people in total, although it didn’t seem like the small living area could accommodate that many people too easily.

‘You have ten people down here at a time?’ I asked.

‘Not often,’ she murmured. She left the room, shutting the door behind her and marched me over to the right of the room. One door that she opened led into a small room. This was obviously Lithuania’s equivalent of the interrogation/prison room. It was one room, divided in two down the middle by a wall of hefty iron bars. The wall was an average wall up to about waist height, and then the top half was made up of the bars, spaced too closely together to fit through. In the middle of the bars was a door with a key hole. On the near side was a table and chairs and a computer. On the other side of the bars, the prison side, was nothing but large, rusted chains hanging down from the brick wall at the back.

Instinctively, I shied away from this room.

‘I won’t put you in here if I feel I can trust you,’ Hurricane said. I dared to let myself relax, just a little. I didn’t like the idea of bars shutting me off from the world at all, and I liked the idea of heavy metal chains fixing my wrists and ankles to the wall even less.

I hardly dared breathe for fear of angering her anymore. She seemed to be deep in thought.

‘Although...you did run away earlier,’ she mused.

‘No...no please don’t fucking do this to me,’ I said, trying to stay strong, but with my heart hammering so loudly I felt sure she could hear it. She seemed to be enjoying striking this fear into my mind, and I loathed her for it.

‘We’ll see,’ she murmured.

This was hardly a conclusion, and as I moved out of the room I felt the knot in my stomach tighten and every muscle in my body tense up. I wouldn’t be chained up like that...I wouldn’t. I could take her on; I was a fully grown man. If only she didn’t have that bloody gun. She would hide behind it and use it both as a weapon and a shield of defence if I so much as touched her.

The final door, which she only briefly opened, was the oddest of all. The entire far wall was made up of many rows and columns of computers, all stacked on top of each other and side by side like the squares on a Rubix cube. The other side of the room was cordoned off by a wire fence, and locks, but on the other side of that wall were many, many guns and other weapons. They were all up on the walls and in cabinets—guns of every shape and size, bullet guns, stun guns, laser guns, tranquiliser guns; grenades and cylinders of chemicals which could only be bombs; tubes of other liquids and powders, which were most likely poisons or drugs to put in the tranquiliser darts; and many more machines which looked like torture instruments or other weapons, which I could put neither a name nor a purpose to.

‘You’re...prepared,’ I said, unsure of anything better to say.

‘We need to be,’ she said. ‘That base we stayed in in Germany is nowhere near well-equipped enough, but it hardly ever gets used because of the proximity to Berlin and another base not far west of it. I just used it the other night because we needed a place to sleep.’

I was treading on thin ice around Hurricane right now, so I didn’t ask any of the questions I wanted the answer to. Instead, I waited quietly until she shut the door and gestured to the raggedy, slightly moth-eaten maroon sofa, indicating for me to sit down. I perched on the edge, watching as she went towards the kitchen area and filled the kettle up.

‘We get hot food tonight,’ she announced, sounding a little pleased with herself.

‘That makes a change,’ I said bitterly, momentarily forgetting my tactics. She gave me a dark look.

‘It’s not my fault, Arjan. I could be treating you a lot worse than I am.’

I didn’t feel guilty for making her feel bad. She deserved to feel terrible.

‘Is there heating in this place?’ I muttered, hoisting my legs up onto the sofa and curling them up to my chest. Even wearing a jacket, I was cold.

She laughed humourlessly. ‘Who d’you think we are? I wasn’t around at the time, but from what I gather, building these places just about bankrupted Dreamers all over the world. It isn’t easy.’

I shrugged, not liking her hostile tone. ‘I was just asking.’

‘Well don’t.’

She opened a cupboard and grabbed a couple of mugs. I had no idea how long they’d been neglected in there, but she washed them out well under the tap before filling one.

‘Coffee?’ she asked.

‘Yeah,’ I said, trying to recall the last time I’d had a hot drink. Or hot food, for that matter.

Even when the coffees were made, she stayed standing in the kitchen, her back up against the worktops running around the side, swaying slightly. I didn’t move from my curled up position on the sofa.

‘Oh, and I can’t be bothered to cook tonight, so it’s ready meals,’ she announced, her tone still unfriendly as always. ‘You want something else and you can cook it.’

She walked briskly across to where she’d left her bag, in which she’d taken some of the food from the car and brought it in.

‘No,’ I said meekly. ‘Ready meals are fine.’

Silently, she began to put them in the microwave, and I went and hesitantly grabbed my coffee. Then I sat in silence.

That was how my life was now.