Chapter 13:
General Buller and Colonel Forster made a visit for a few days. John was moved back to Ward 3, they said that some modifications were needed in his own room. John wondered why they bothered with excuses. He was a prisoner, and could do with him pretty much what they wanted.
The first morning in Room 3, John was showering. He frowned. He was sure that it was Forster watching closely, but maybe it would be more prudent not to show that he knew. He turned the shower on as hot as he could stand instead, hoping that the window would fog up sufficiently that he was invisible. He twisted a towel around his waist as soon as he was dry, though he seldom bothered normally. There was an uncomfortable sexual element in that inspection of his body.
In the observation room, Forster was casually saying to Isaac that the subject seemed quite healthy now. Isaac wished he could think of a way to stop him licking his lips over John’s body. It hadn’t occurred to him before, but now that he was fit and healthy, John had a body that might tempt a man that way inclined. At least John was safe enough from any real molestation, as there was not a moment of the day that cameras were not on him. They could be a protection as well as an intrusion.
The general with his off-sider, Forster, watched a lot of film of John that day and the following. Buller was amused when Forster took certain film to his room; he knew the weaknesses of his subordinate. In the file were some photographs of John as he’d been found. Forster looked at those a long time. Buller wasn’t sure if anyone had told John that he’d once been raped. There was no real purpose in telling him.
The second morning in Ward 3, John switched on the hot tap in the shower and ran it for a while before he even stripped. And again, afterward, he put a towel around his waist. It was just a visit, he’d been told, and there was no hint that Forster might again be put in charge of him. He wasn’t happy, but didn’t feel the fear that had gripped him the previous time Forster was around.
He was released at the same time as usual. A lot of the soldiers were off with the flu, but Ernest and Adam were all right, and John enjoyed a gallop on the track they’d started to wear next to the external fence, the three big horses thundering around together. The B Force guards watched him, the man in the bright red shirt looking happy as he rode, even though on lead. The leather thong that usually held his hair in a pony tail had broken that day, and his long hair streamed out behind him.
“Martian or just a hippy?” one said.
“He’s actually from Alpha Centauri,” said the other, in a voice of authority.
Zack met him when he returned, saying that Davies thought he’d enjoy the planned activity for the day. John knew that probably meant that the activity was planned with the participation of Isaac, who thought it a good way of doing his research on the lab rat. But the things that Davies devised were often fun, and he walked with anticipation.
The obstacle race was to be run in teams, and was carefully planned. Isaac had formed the hypothesis that John was using his telepathic talent to know where things were. At each place where he was expected to have difficulty seeing, there were to be stationed two men, primed to think hard of the rope or the beam in a different spot than it actually was. The technicians had been hard at work rigging extra cameras. No move would be missed. There were to be prizes for each on the winning team and Davies held up a box of chocolates and a green T-shirt, hopefully an additional temptation for John.
John glanced up at the camera that watched as Davies asked if he wanted to take part. Mark was anxious, far more than he should have been. John frowned. Mark crossed his fingers. John turned to Davies, who was also holding his breath, “Of course I want to participate. It looks enormous fun.” Mark gave a quiet sigh of relief.
Isaac watched closely, as did Mark, General Buller, and Colonel Forster. John hesitated longer than usual at the first of the difficult places, but then grabbed the rope and was off. The misdirection had no apparent effect thereafter.
His was not the winning team, and he asked Zack, grinning, how long he’d have been allowed to keep that shirt in any case.
Zack grinned back. “I’d have let you keep it for the day.”
Mark was pleased, and wondered again how much his subject knew of what was supposed to be hidden from him. The general was impressed, but said that the interrogation would proceed as planned. Mark objected again, but Buller was adamant. The escape had been too nearly successful, and while the planned measure to be taken, was approved, he said that it was essential that they know how John had managed it.
The senior officers were served with a very good lunch, during which Bedville spoke persuasively of the benefits of allowing the subject a large degree of freedom in order to learn as much about him as possible. Buller listened, and observed that the morning’s demonstration had been impressive.
Forster spoke equally persuasively of the benefits of a closer confinement coupled with rigorous discipline.
Buller looked at him with amusement. “Didn’t work too well, last time, did it?”
Forster flushed. Two weeks in hospital, and several more having his meals through a straw.
Mark said, “Since adopting this policy, I have not had a single man hurt, and I suspect the subject could be very dangerous if he chooses.”
Isaac went on to talk about examples of apparent telepathy.
“What about the woman?” asked Buller.
Mark said, “Nothing of a great deal of significance. He says he’s a hollow man, and she’s convinced the amnesia is genuine, but we never really doubted that.”
“Fancy providing a prisoner with a whore,” said Forster, in disgust.
Buller said reprovingly that Miss Glover was a highly skilled agent, and John Doe was, by no means, an ordinary prisoner. “We need to know what it is that he can do,” he said, “And while Mark’s results might be slow in coming, they are coming.” But then he nodded at Forster. “You can have a go at him this afternoon, however, and we’ll see how you do.”
Lunchtime, John was chatting with Jimmy and Brian, as Zack and Bob watched from their position near the door. Zack took a message, and murmured to Bob. Bob looked worried. Shortly afterward, Lance and Nicholas filed into position next to them.
John was trying to persuade Sylvia to let him have a second dessert. “You’re not sick any more, John,” she said, “You don’t need it.”
John turned beseeching eyes on her. “Yes, but I might get sick at any moment, and then if I’m fat beforehand, I won’t get so thin!”
Sylvia laughed at the argument, and handed him a second dessert.
Jimmy looked at his second dessert when he rejoined them. “They won’t let us have any more than the allotted meal!”
John twinkled at him. “I’m privileged.”
They let him finish his meal, and even have coffee before coming for him. And when Jimmy saw his face become expressionless, and the four unsmiling men who walked close, he thought him not so privileged. He and Brian glanced at each other, and were very quiet as they walked back to their position on guard at the main gates.
John had only once been in the Administration Block. This time he was led to a large room, bare except for one solidly made chair. On two sides were large windows he couldn’t see through, but he knew that men watched from behind. He started to tremble. No matter how he tried, he could never control his trembling. His face showed no expression.
More men waited, five of them. He felt them, and knew he’d never met them. The ones he knew, left the room. He stared after them, feeling momentarily deserted, before reminding himself that it made no difference really. Zack and the others - they too, were his jailers.
“Sit in the chair,” a man told him. He wore glasses, this man, and looked more like a clerk than a soldier, but John only saw his appearance when someone behind him turned his eyes on him. He hesitated. He didn’t want to sit in the chair while those threatening men stood around him.
Two men close to him pu
lled out their batons, and ran them through their fingers. The gesture was wasted on John, who didn’t see. But he felt the threat nevertheless. “Sit in the chair,” was repeated, with more emphasis.
John sat. Now that he looked more harmless, Colonel Forster entered the room. “These are men from B Force,” he said. “Sergeant Nicholls is going to ask you about the night you nearly escaped. If you do not cooperate with proper answers, you will be handcuffed to the chair in which you sit, until we do get answers.”
John’s trembling, oddly, ceased, and he looked apparently calmly at Forster, but his voice had a tremor. “I panic when I am tied. I cannot help it. If I panic, then someone could be hurt.”
Forster smiled at the man he knew could barely see. “We’ll risk it.” He turned and left the room.
Isaac wasn’t present, though he had a good idea what was planned. He didn’t want to see John hurt, even though Buller agreed that there would be no physical hurt. He used the excuse that he had the flu, very much hoping that John would not need him afterwards. A replacement was doing the daily soldiers’ clinic, but he didn’t want anyone else looking after John.
Mark had no choice whether or not he should watch. Forster watched avidly through the window. He was loving this. He’d watched old film of John panicking and begging for release when restrained, and knew that the fear of being tied up would soon have him begging.
Nicholls began the questioning. “How did you make the cameras stop working?”
When John only looked stony in response to his questions, he nodded at Lockyer, who grabbed John’s right wrist, and handcuffed it to the chair, with the help of another. Young, on the other side, failed to restrain the twisting figure in the chair, and was hit instead.
John was tied to a chair, the panic was in him, and he started fighting. His left fist was brought into play first, but then he discovered that the chair could be lifted and swung with the right arm. It made a fearsome weapon, and his speed and fury were awesome. Only Nicholls escaped from the room, four others were fallen. One tried to rise, and the chair crashed down on him again. Buller was stunned at the swift defeat of five soldiers.
Bedville smiled slightly. “Release him?” he asked Buller.
Buller inclined his head in defeat, “Release him.”
John was still struggling against the restraint, hurling the chair at the window now, as if that might free him. His wrist streamed with blood. He was not seeing, not sensible, though he ignored the fallen men as long as they remained motionless. Zack was brought in to the observation room, staring awestruck through the window at the man he’d been in charge of for so many months. “He’s gone mad!” he said quietly.
Mark shook his head. “I don’t think so, and you’re his friend. Come straight back out if he threatens you, but try and persuade him to let you take the handcuffs off.” He flinched as the chair crashed into the window again.
Zack edged quietly into the room, trying to talk to John. John crashed the chair at him, but it went to the side. Again, this time to the other side. Zack went on talking, watching him closely. He tripped over one of the fallen men, unable to dodge, and the chair came crashing down - on the floor next to him. John was breathing fast, still in a panic. Zack slipped out the door. “Try Clare?” he suggested.
Back in the interrogation room, Lockyer suddenly tried to reach the door. Unerringly, the chair came crashing down on his back. John was still a moment, fighting to remove the handcuffs, continually jerking his wrist against the chair, held in his other hand. But his relative selfcontrol seemed to desert him again, and he started beating the chair against the floor, totally ignoring the injury he was causing himself. The chair was beginning to disintegrate.
Mark watched closely, flinching as the chair came crashing against the window again. A crack now ran across the toughened glass.
Clare paused, looking at her terrified lover, and the bodies strewn around him. None were unconscious, each of them just lying very still, and waiting. Silently, Forster handed her a key. Clare nodded.
John was backed up against a wall, whitefaced, and trembling again. Clare held up the key. “I’m going to take off the handcuffs, John, and then you can be calm again.”
John stared at her, but didn’t move as she slowly approached. She undid the handcuff, and he held his wrist, the blood streaming between his fingers.
“Come to me,” she said, and put her arms around him.
He was still silent, trembling, but didn’t resist the embrace.
When Mark entered, she calmly asked if she could take John to her room. Mark nodded. His four familiar escorts followed, and then took up station outside her room. Clare held him close and comforted him. They had hardly ever before watched in her room at the time the action happened, but now she could be in danger from the subject, and she was watched. The pair sat on the edge of the bed, until John was suddenly crying in her arms. When his sobs finally ceased, it was Nicki who came in and tended to the hurt wrist.
“I’ll take you back to your room when you’re ready,” Clare said.
John looked at the floor and spoke in a low voice. “They’ll probably kill me now.”
Clare held him close, and stroked his head. “They won’t kill you. I don’t think anyone’s even badly hurt.”
“One day they’ll kill me, and then I’ll be just their specimen to dissect.” Clare pulled him closer.
She took him back to his room after a while, and he squeezed her hand, thanked her in a low, shamed voice, and went inside. He was not locked in until dark, but all afternoon, he never tried his door, just sat in a chair, staring into the distance, and, more often than not, was seen to be trembling.
His evening meal was brought to him in his room. Afterward, Mark went to see him. He shook his head at Josephs as he started to follow him into his room. Mark spoke in a carefully neutral tone. “John, let’s just sit a while, and talk.”
John nodded. Mark noticed that again, he was trembling. John stared at the floor and said, “I’m sorry.”
Mark leaned forward and touched his shoulder. “The men are only bruised, a couple have a few cracked ribs.”
John still wouldn’t look at him. “I panicked.”
Mark smiled slightly. “I’ve never seen anyone panic in quite such a spectacular fashion.”
John glanced up. He’d expected severe punishment.
Mark said, “Can I make you a coffee?”
John stood, “I’ll make it,” and Mark watched as he prepared two coffees, only feeling around a touch for the milk in the small fridge, scarcely bothering looking when he couldn’t see in any case. “Biscuits?”
Mark accepted a fancy chocolate biscuit. John smiled suddenly. “It’s Lyn, she does the room and keeps me supplied. I seem to be getting fancier and fancier biscuits.”
Mark laughed. “So if Clare vanished, you’d have Lyn for company.”
John shook his head. “Lyn’s about sixty. She would like to mother me.”
Mark said, “You know, if you wanted to keep me in charge of you, you couldn’t have done better. You cooperated beautifully this morning when my philosophy was followed. But the General insisted that Forster try his methods. You made a fiasco of his interrogation. Mine may not have been any more effective, but at least no-one was hurt.”
John was beginning to relax. “Was it your idea, offering a prize of a green shirt?”
“Did you see through that?”
John touched the red shirt he wore. “I love this color, but green would be nice for a change.”
Mark thought that he was doing well. John was a lot more relaxed. It had hurt Mark, a little, when he’d seen him tell Clare that one day he’d be just their specimen to dissect. Is that what he really thought? He spoke seriously. “John, as long as you behave reasonably, you have nothing to fear from us. I know you think we’re your jailers, and so we are. But we are not inhumane. You will not have to suffer cruel treatment as long as I’m
in charge, and I do not expect anyone else to be put in charge after today.”
John’s eyes were on Mark, and Mark wondered if he was feeling for the sincerity behind his words. He added, “Even today. I admit you were treated cruelly, but I don’t think General Buller understood your terror of being tied up. You were never in danger of being beaten or otherwise seriously mistreated.” He rose. “You will not be punished. You can’t ride tomorrow, but it’s only because both Adam and Ernest are down with flu.”
John rose, and said, “Mark, thank you.”
Mark smiled. “I’ll just have another of those biscuits. They don’t give me biscuits like that.”
John told himself firmly the following morning that there was no point being embarrassed at his ridiculous behavior, he couldn’t hide, and he couldn’t run. So he put a brave face on things, apologized to Zack, thankful that the chair hadn’t hit him, and when the time came, strolled over to where Sergeant Davies roared at the men to get ready, as they were doing thirty miles today, bruises or not.
He watched for a while, waving in answer to the called greetings. “They’ve been fighting,” he remarked to Zack.
Zack grinned. He’d been fighting, too, though the bruises didn’t show. A major brawl between A Force and B Force. A few were still in the lockup. A few were out of action entirely. ‘The Martian’ had been hurt by B Force. B Force said that four of their number had been injured by the Martian. A Force reckoned that John was theirs, and B Force declared that they had every intention of shooting him the moment they had an excuse. Zack didn’t explain, only saying that soldiers could be as irresponsible as anyone else when they chose.
“Can I come?” John called to Davies, as they prepared to depart.
“Don’t be silly!” said Davies, as he always did.
“I could hardly escape from the middle of forty or so soldiers,” said John to Zack.
But Zack just shrugged. He didn’t know what John could do, and thought that it would be very foolish indeed for him to be allowed outside, even with the escort of forty soldiers.
There was only Zack and Lance with him that day, as both Bob and Rudy were down with flu. The ranks among the soldiers were diminished for the same reason. John’s wrist was bandaged, and when he jumped to the lowermost branch of his favorite tree, he swore, and dropped back to the ground. Discontentedly, he sat at the base instead.
“Wrist sore?” Lance asked.
John nodded and reddened. “I was incredibly stupid yesterday. It serves me right.”
Zack joined them. “I heard you did warn them,” he said, “They deserved a few bruises.”
John cast him a scant, sidelong glance. “I’m very glad I didn’t hurt you.”
Zack said calmly, “You weren’t trying. I’ve seen the film. You quite deliberately missed me.”
John was surprised, “Did I?”
Zack nodded. John’s blush deepened. “I hope I did. I wasn’t thinking straight.”
“Going to see Clare later?”
John nodded. “You can’t not see people just because you’ve made a fool of yourself,” and added, “Mind you, if I was a free man, I’d be in Australia by now, and never face anyone again!”
Lance laughed and punched him lightly on his arm. “You make life interesting!”
John grinned and looked up at his tree. The leaves would be thick enough soon.
******