Unlawful Restraint Read online

  He found the broken broom handle and sat in the corner facing the door. Either no one would open that door ever again, in which case he would have to get creative about getting out of here, or someone would open the door. The problem was that someone who opened the door could be friend or foe, and he wouldn’t know until the door opened, if even then.

  He wondered if the hinges were on the inside or outside of the door. If the house was built correctly, they would be on the inside. But you never knew. And apparently the door had been modified so there were no cracks that outside light could stream through to illuminate the interior. If he were to take the time to do that, he’d damn well swap the hinges so his prisoner couldn’t get out. Then again, they might not have thought about it.

  He stood up to go to the door and swayed a little. He’d need food soon if he were to keep thinking clearly. He steadied himself against the wall and walked to the door. His fingers found the door jamb almost immediately, which he took as a good sign. He trailed his fingers across the wood to the frame on the other side and slid his fingers up the crack where door met frame.

  He was in luck, his fingers caught the cold metal of the hinge where it protruded. He felt the pin that held the hinge together – the top of the bolt was flat, like a nail, but what would he find at the bottom?

  Nothing. It was a straight pin. No screw, no nut, no plug at the bottom to keep him from removing the pin. Good. He wouldn’t be clawing his way out through the walls after all. The second piece of good news that day.

  He went back to his corner and waited. He wanted to think this through before he acted. Clearly, when it came to his captors, now would be a good time to escape. They were distracted by the invading force, whoever that was. But this might not be a fantastic time for attempting to flee the town. There were a lot of bullets flying around, and he doubted either side was clear on whose team he was on. Either side might shoot him.

  Should he escape the room and then find another place to hide? Or just wait until the shooting stopped and see what had happened? He easily could wait until nightfall and sneak out later. That seemed the best course of action. He would wait until dark or, not knowing when night actually was, he’d wait until the town was silent. He’d be able to hear the clock chime. If it chimed twice and the place was quiet, then he’d sneak out.

  He began to feel less shaky, surer of himself. He’d be able to get food and water as soon as he let himself out of here, and that wouldn’t be long now. He felt hope surge through his body, his heart beating intensely, his breathing firm. Terror had made a mistake and he, Glen, was going to take advantage of it. He smiled in the dark. He would enjoy getting the better of Terror, that was for sure.

  The irony didn’t escape him. He knew if he hadn’t tried stealing from Terror, he wouldn’t be in this predicament. But he also wasn’t capable of letting the boy, Christian, die. He knew he was really a man, and not a boy, but he couldn’t help noticing the similarities between Christian and Clarence, and Christian was a boy in need.

  Of course, physically they were nothing the same. Christian was not yet three when he died. Clarence was a grown man. Christian had been a small boy, pale and thin-limbed. Clarence was a swarthy man, well-muscled and dark skinned, tattoos covering his arms and torso.

  Wait.

  He’d gotten their names confused. Clarence was his toddler son, Christian, the well-built man. How could he have switched them like that? They were melding in his brain, Christian was becoming Clarence to him. He supposed it was natural, in a way. Christian was vulnerable, hurt and dying. Glen could save him. If he rescued Christian, would it make up for not being able to help Clarence, his baby son who had expired in his arms?

  His face was wet. He hadn’t realized he’d been crying. He wiped his face with the hem of his Henley and pulled himself together. Sensory deprivation was unnerving him, sending him into a spiral of self-indulgent thoughts. He’d do better to concentrate on the task at hand.

  He made himself listen to the conflict. Bullets thudding into wood and metal, the occasional scream or oath when they found flesh. The running feet. Voices calling “fall back,” or “move in,” and there were whispered voices in the house. There above him, murmurs and rustling, the cry of a child. He wasn’t the only person trapped here.

  There were boots on the porch steps, the front door was thrown open and crashed against the wall. Glen tensed himself, ready to fight, to defend himself the best he could. But the steps bypassed the room his closet was in. They went up another floor, and there was a hushed conversation. The voices of two women, he thought. Then a cracking sound he couldn’t decipher and silence.

  Nothing could be heard from above. No voices, no rustling, nothing. He began to fear the children had been killed and he was horrified. Even the most barbaric of people did not execute children. But that was before. Maybe now it was total annihilation for the losing side.

  The fighting increased as they headed toward the middle of town. Twice bullets ricocheted off the wall behind their heads before Terror let Angelica convince him to wait in the pharmacy while she scouted ahead. His hand was throbbing, and in the drug store, he could find painkillers while he waited for her to return. His head was pounding in time with his fist, and Terror needed a minute to collect himself. He seemed to be having trouble controlling his anger too, and that wasn’t like him. He needed to calm down, to reset, or whatever it was that the New Age crystal gazers said.

  “Stay put, so I can find you when I need to,” she said as she left. He would have shot a man who dared to tell him what to do. But his knuckles stung and ached, so he waved her away with his other hand and turned to scan the products on the shelves.

  He was surprised at how little there was. They would have to raid another town. The odds and ends of products were a hodgepodge of things useful from the kitchen to the garage – if you had an imagination. There was a hot water bottle on one of the lower shelves, a helpful item, but not what he was looking for at the moment. When he didn’t find anything but baby aspirin, he felt in his pocket for his keys and let himself into the medicine storage area behind the pharmacy counter.

  He found acetaminophen with codeine and popped a couple of tablets. Pocketing the bottle, he went searching for more. He found injectables he was tempted to try, but remembering they were in the middle of a battle, decided not to do so. At least not yet. He slid a vial into his pocket just in case he needed it later. On the floor, he found one of those packs that turned cold when you smack it, and he whacked it on the counter and held it over his throbbing knuckles.

  If there were a couch in here, he would have laid down for a minute. Given the meds time to kick in. He thought about lying down somewhere and resting his injured hand on his chest and laying the ice pack over the top of it. Maybe if he remained still, everything would stop hurting. A burst of anger shot through him. Real men didn’t have to rest because they were in pain. Real men worked through it. Ignored it. He would not turn into a pussy that had to lie down when he got a splinter.

  He went back out into the central part of the store and found soda on the shelf. He kind of wished it was cold. He took it into the meds room and opened the medical refrigerator. He could cool it for later. He laughed when the light came on in the fridge. There were already a dozen sodas chilling amid the bottles and boxes. He put the warm drink in and pulled a cold one out, holding it against his body with his arm so he could get it open with his uninjured hand.

  The first swig tasted right just because it was cold, but after the second swallow he examined the bottle. Diet! Shit! He tossed the bottle out the med room door. It hit the glass entrance door and sprayed everywhere. At least it was diet, so it wouldn’t make things sticky like sugary drinks would. He watched with some regret as the remainder of the soda drained from the bottle.

  He opened the fridge again and discovered that not all of the soda was diet. Thank God for that. He twisted off the top of a cola and took a swig. “That’s what I’m talkin’ �
��bout,” he said, and chugged half the bottle. He was feeling better now, his mood rebounding with the ingestion of painkillers and sugar.

  He wandered into the store proper and began scanning the shelves again. He picked up a glow stick and examined it. There must be some use for it, but it wasn’t what he was looking for. He tossed it back on the shelf and picked up a package of party favors. They were the things that kids blew into and a curl of paper unfurled to the sound of a horn.

  He tossed those down too. Worthless. The old world was full of useless shit. He should toss it all in a pile and set fire to it. Not much worth anything now. Hair dye. Douche. He didn’t have a clue what that was used for. A woman’s thing was all he knew, what it was used for he didn’t want to know.

  There was a packet of combs in a clear plastic case. He had a couple of men who could use those. One box of an off-brand of toothpaste, and three boxes of Epsom salts. A thumb splint. The thumb splint made him think of his swollen hand, and he looked for something to splint his knuckles. There didn’t appear to be a knuckle splint, or if there had been, it wasn’t there anymore.

  Did they make knuckle splints? He couldn’t remember ever seeing one. He wondered if he’d broken anything else in his hand. Would the doctor have to set the bones? He welcomed the thought of that pain. Cleansing pain, although he knew he wouldn’t like it when it happened, it would clear his mind. Bring him back to himself.

  Where was Angelica? This was taking too much time. He picked up a greeting card that had fallen to the floor. “Thinking of you”, it said. More trash. He thought about taking a match to the building. Fire was cleansing too. He looked around for a lighter or matches. Those were useful. Ergo, there weren’t any left in this room.

  It occurred to him that he shouldn’t burn down this building because of the medicines housed in the other room. His hands itched, and he felt his anger building again. He had the need to ignite the building. Why not burn down the whole town?

  He left the pharmacy. He needed to do something with all this destructive energy. What better way than to engage in the gun battle? He felt for his handgun and his hatchet. They both were there, ready to be of service. He smiled. He’d catch up with Angelica and join in the battle. He turned and strode down the street in the direction of the gunfire.

  The door to Glen’s closet slammed open, which took him by surprise. He jumped to his feet, the broomstick held like a sword, ready to do battle. What he saw surprised him. Even backlit, it was clearly a woman. She couldn’t have been much taller than five-foot four, was dressed in tactical gear that didn’t hide her curves and was carrying an AK-47.

  She stepped backward out of the doorway and said, “Come on, Doc, time to go.”

  He followed her out, blinking in the afternoon light. He marveled that she could get to the door and open it without making a sound. He’d had no clue she’d entered the room, and he had been listening closely. He towered over her, but she was unmistakably the one in control. It was clear she was no stranger to the firearm she carried.

  “What happened to the people upstairs?” he asked. “Did you kill them?”

  “No, I didn’t kill them.” She laughed. “Why would I do that? They are under my protection. No, I only told them that if they weren’t quieter, Terror was going to come up and shut them up himself. We could hear them from the outside.”

  He could see now that she was dark-skinned, Latina if he was to hazard a guess. Along with her beautiful milk chocolate complexion, she had large dark brown eyes and short black hair gelled into spikes. Glen wondered briefly where she got the gel. It couldn’t be easy to find.

  Glen felt the relief wash over him. The children were alive. So this was one of Terror’s army of military enforcers. She was intimidating enough. He followed her out of the room and down into the foyer. There was a rack of rifles hanging on the wall there. She set her weapon on a dresser that was in the hall, picked up a gun, cracked it open and looked down the barrel. She pulled a box of shells from a drawer in the dresser and handed to him.

  “Know how to use a rifle?” she asked.

  “I’m competent,” he answered. Even though he thought he was more than competent, a woman of her military experience might not agree.

  “I’m Angelica Barrino,” she said, “one of Tyrell Moore’s generals. At least that is what he likes to call us. I’m glad you can use a rifle, doctor, because we are being overrun and we need all the shooters we can find.”

  “Who started this?” he asked.

  “If you ask them, we did,” she said. “These people used to be from this town, but they elected not to stay under Moore’s rule.”

  Glen noticed again that she did not call him Terror, and wondered why. Perhaps she had known him before he was called Terror and couldn’t make the switch.

  “Every so often they try to retake the town. Some of their people get killed or wounded, some of our people get killed or wounded, we chase them back to their settlement, and they lay low for a while. Then there is something they need or want, and they come here to try getting it and taking the town back. It’s boring. I’m glad we have you because our doc is drunk, and when the fighting stops there will be a boatload of wounded.”

  “Your doctor is drunk again?” Glen asked. “He was too drunk to practice medicine yesterday.” At least he thought it was yesterday, being in the darkness skewed his sense of time.

  “You misunderstand,” Angelica said. “He’s not just drunk now, he’s always drunk. He’s a drunk. Completely useless for anything but the most basic care. And even then, someone has to keep an eye on what he’s doing. He almost killed a man giving him the wrong medication.”

  “I see,” Glen said, and he did. “I’ve seen that before. The responsibility of having people’s lives in your hands gets to be too much, and they turn to drink. Pretty soon they are always drunk.”

  “Did that happen to you?” she asked, looking at him piercingly.

  “No, that did not happen to me,” he said.

  “So what did happen? By all rights, you should be holed up in a city hospital somewhere. They say the hospitals are the only place where there is any semblance of the rule of law. Because people need medical help, so they play by the rules,” she said.

  “I left medicine before the fall,” he said, meaning the fall of civilization. “So, I wouldn’t know.”

  “Why would you spend all those years training to be a physician and then give it up?” she asked.

  “I lost my wife and son to a drunken driver,” he said. “I felt that couldn’t recover from that, so I left. I already was living off the grid when the world ended.”

  “That explains it then,” she said and changed the subject. “We are going out now. Try not to shoot our people. I know you don’t know all of us by sight, so pay attention. Only shoot people who are shooting at you. We all know who you are. Any questions?”

  “Can’t the two factions sit down and talk it out?” Glen asked. “This bloodshed is so unnecessary.”

  “They are the ones who attacked us,” she said. “Not the other way around. We are protecting our way of life. They could join us at any time, they just have to accept Moore’s terms.”

  “What are those?” he asked.

  “What he says, goes,” she said. “That’s it.”

  But Glen thought Angelica looked as if something wasn’t sitting right with her. Her mouth was pinched, and she had her eyebrows drawn together. She wasn’t altogether happy with Terror’s rule of law. He wondered if it had anything to do with the woman, Anne, who’d been so severely beaten. Maybe that wasn’t the only thing that was bugging her.

  “Something bothering you?” he asked. “It’s just that you had an odd look on your face.”

  “Not unless you mean the war that’s going on outside these walls. The amount of time it’s taking us to get back out there is bothering me. Are you ready to go?”

  “It’s raining. Do you have a jacket I can wear? I don’t know what happened to mi
ne,” he said.

  She nodded and left the room. Glen wondered why she wasn’t soaking wet. She came back with a raincoat that was as big as a tent, but he wasn’t going to complain. It would keep him dry.

  “Another thing,” she said, before opening the door, “if you get captured by the other side, I suggest you tell them you were our hostage and that we made you take up arms. They are not nice to our citizens. When they come back, if they come back, they often are missing parts of their anatomy. Understand?”

  “Oh yes,” he said. “I understand.” And he did understand only too well what she meant.

  Chapter Five

  The next thing Glen knew she was yelling “Go! Go! Go!” and he was running down the steps and out into the street. Gunfire sounded from the end of the block as he ducked behind a tree on the other side of the street. Bark sprayed around him as a bullet hit the tree, but then Angelica returned fire and was yelling at him to follow.

  He ducked back out from behind the tree, running low, keeping his head down. He wanted to be the smallest target possible. He followed Angelica around the corner onto Main Street and noticed the dead man on the pavement. She’d killed him with a shot to the head. What must it be like to have that kind of precision?

  They ran up the street, keeping down, dodging behind parked cars, telephone poles, and heavy concrete garbage containers. Someone had filled one of the hanging baskets with flowers, and as Glen ran beneath it, it exploded and rained dirt and flowers on his head. He had a fleeting thought of a young woman finding it after the battle and how disappointed she would be.

  He followed Angelica as she sprinted across Main Street and the grassy mall, to the open area in front of Town Hall. A group of the invaders was holed up, hiding behind the pillars that flanked the main entrance. He dove behind another of the concrete garbage containers, barely avoiding getting hit. The bullet hit the sidewalk, inches from his position, rebounding to the left and sending a chip of concrete past his ear.