Chapter 1
At first there was nothing. No sense, no feeling. Everything was dark and silent. His eyes felt sticky, his lashes almost glued shut. He opened them with difficulty, blinking rapidly. That was the first sensory input his brain registered, there was nothing to see except complete blackness. Then came the cold.
Not cold in the ordinary sense, but marrow deep cold, filling him, overwhelming. He was so cold he was afraid to move in case he broke, shattered like brittle glass. Then he was afraid he couldn’t move! Foolishly he tried to raise his arm. He wanted to cry out against the pain, fear squeezed his heart, blood boomed loud in his ears, fire bloomed in his shoulder, the joint screamed at him. His throat refused to respond, there was no sound except a weak, strangled whimper.
Panic washed over him in waves. He didn’t know where he was, worse, he didn’t know who he was. The seconds of fear seemed like hours, stretching raw against his nerves. He had to calm down, relax, try to think, THINK! Closing his tacky eyelids, he fought to relax himself, forcing his body to go limp, blanking his mind. He slowed his breathing, evened it out, his thought processes kicked into gear.
His mind was hazy at first, slow to recollect. The calmer he became the clearer his thinking was. The darkness was oppressive, pressing down on his chest like a lead weight. He fought to ignore it, to stifle the rising panic bubbling just below the surface of his sanity.
BOWDEN! Alexander Bowden, that’s who he was. Alexander Bowden.
“Thank God,” he said, or at least, he thought he said it. It was more of a croak. But at least he had remembered his name. It was a start.
He continued to try and think, but nothing else came.
He sensed that he was enclosed, boxed in. The panic welled up again. Christ! It felt like a coffin.
“Uhhhhh!” he grunted trying to raise his arms, they felt like lead. Pain flared. They remained unresponsive. Dead. He grunted again; fear searing deeper into his brain.
This was no good. Panicking was getting him nowhere. He had to relax again, be calm, calm. Stifling the urge to scream, partly because Bowden knew it would hurt, and, secondly, he didn’t think he could anyway, he forced himself to relax. Once again, he allowed his body to go limp, loose. Tentatively he flexed his hands, stretched his fingers. It hurt but it felt good to move. Slowly he attempted to clench his hands into fists.
It was hard, very hard, but bit by bit his fingers curled, tightened, balled into weak fists. Sweat chilled Bowden’s forehead, he swallowed, it felt as if there was a lump in his throat the size of a basketball. He maintained his calm. He tried flexing his arms. Slowly, painfully his left arm responded. Bowden almost raised it vertically from the elbow when his knuckles encountered resistance. His hand was too numb to make sense of it by touch, but he knew what it was, the lid of the box.
Exhausted Bowden’s arm flopped down beside him again. He considered the situation. He was on his back, in a box, very weak, very cold.
“Coffin”, his mind screamed, had he somehow been buried alive?
Panic almost undid him, pain flared in his chest, crushing, adrenaline surging through his electrified veins. It wasn’t a coffin, couldn’t be… He didn’t know how, it just knew it wasn’t, which beggared the question, what the hell was it? Everything was blank. He remembered his name but that was all. Everything else was hidden behind a wall of impenetrable blackness.
After resting a few more minutes Bowden tried flexing his legs. Protesting they obeyed his mental commands as he once again tentatively made them bend at the knee. The pain was exquisite, like slivers of ice, razor sharp, deep in the joint, but he wasn’t going to give up. He focused on the leg, all his will ordering it, commanding it to keep bending, demanding it obey.
Finally the knee touched the lid of his prison. Gratefully Bowden lowered the limb with a deep sigh of relief. Over an indeterminable amount of time, and pain, Bowden flexed every part of his body in rotation. He clenched his fingers, wiggled his toes, moving every limb till the ache and stiffness started to dissipate. He felt warmer now though he felt it had nothing to do with his exertions. The temperature within the box was actually rising. For a brief moment Bowden feared suffocation, chiding himself for being stupid almost as soon as the thought entered his head. The box couldn’t be airtight. If it had been he would have already been dead, of that he was certain.
His whole body tingled with returning circulation, pins and needles making him groan. Bowden raised his arms and at the same time bent his legs, the pain was so excruciating. He wanted to roll into a ball as the pain increased but the confines of the box wouldn’t allow it. Reaching out to the sides of the box bracing himself against the onslaught of agony, Bowden’s fingers brushed against a small metal box fixed to the wall of his prison, he felt some buttons, he heard a click. He tensed as a rush of compressed air breathed over him followed by another click. More hissing of air as the lid of the box swung upwards and to the right, swiveling wide open.
The light wasn’t bright, but after the complete darkness of the box it was blinding.
Bowden cried out, covering his face, tears flowed out of his eyes, ran down his cheeks, trickled into his ears. Blinking away the water Bowden opened his eyes, squeezed them shut and then opened them again. The light wasn’t so painful now, he lowered his arms.
Except for the low wattage bulb, set in the concrete ceiling directly above him, Bowden could see nothing beyond the edge of the box. With an effort he raised his head on creaking neck muscles and looked down toward his feet. He was shocked to find that he was completely naked.
Putting aside his surprise Bowden visually examined the interior of his prison. The lid and walls were heavily padded with some sort of greyish material which sparkled weirdly. There were also several openings at set intervals along the side of the box, presumably something to do with the oxygen supply and temperature. The thin silver tubing that crisscrossed the edges of the box confounded him.
Examining the small box down at his right hand he discovered two buttons, one red the other green. The red button had an engraved arrow on it, pointing downwards; the green had the same except the arrow was pointing up. He surmised it was the controls for opening and closing the box but wasn’t of a mind to test the theory.
What he did want was to get out of the box, needed too in fact and pretty damned quick. Maybe it wasn’t a coffin but it sure as hell felt like one and that was enough. Right now he wasn’t ready to lie down and be dead. Bowden doubted he had the strength to get out, he was determined to try. Slowly he raised his left hand, it felt as if he were trying to move it through thick treacle as it slowly rose upwards. He slipped his fingers into the gap between the rear of the box and its open lid. Then he concentrated on getting his right hand up over the other edge of the box.
Breathing heavily with the effort Bowden had to rest, just for a minute, before the big one. He closed his eyes steeling himself for the moment. With a sudden surge he pulled himself up, his entire weight on his shrieking arms. The muscles cracked sending knifes of agony into his brain. Lights burst before his eyes, he squeezed them shut, grimacing with pain. The lights continued to explode on the inside of his eyelids.
The room swirled about him, his equilibrium totally shot. Bowden slumped sideways over the edge of the box, his cheek banging hard on the cold metallic tubing. He groaned but was powerless to lift himself up. His right arm hung uselessly outside of the box; dimly he could feel it swinging limply back and forth as the edge of the box dug cruelly into his chest.
“Bad mistake,” he mumbled.
His head swam as the room slowly settled down. Cold sweat popped onto his forehead. Bowden wanted to vomit, the bile bitter at the back of his throat, but there was nothing to puke as he dry heaved, the effort burning his throat.
Slowly he regained his senses if not his strength. The edge of the box was still cutting across his chest, dulling to an ache, his body going numb. He couldn’t afford that to happen, he had to get up, but Bowden couldn’t move.
“Son of a bitch.”
He was able to take in a little more of his surroundings by painfully turning his head. There was nothing near to hand that might help him.
The room was large, dimly lit. A dark bulk squatted over to his left, big, metallic, and coffin-like. Bowden realized it was another box like this one. He wondered if there was anyone inside. He still couldn’t decide what the boxes were. The other box had several tubes running out of it across the floor and into the nearby wall. Some of the tubes ended in a small square machine situated at the foot of the wall. Bowden couldn’t even begin to guess its purpose.
From what he could see of the rest of the room Bowden got the impression he was deep within a building, or possibly even underground. The walls boasted no windows, no view of the outside world. The thought struck a chord in his memory. He tried to hold onto it, but it was gone like a wisp of smoke on a windy day. The walls were bare stone, cold, grey; no attempt had been made to make them more prepossessing or attractive. The room screamed of practicability, bleak and cheerless reminding Bowden of a dungeon.
He shuddered and it wasn’t because he was cold. In fact the room was quite warm, the air fresh. The low hum of machinery reached Bowden’s ears. Pump. Air pumps, or maybe fans? He wasn’t sure. There was no machinery evident within his very limited vision, though it did reinforce his theory of being underground.
Gritting his teeth Bowden fumbled for and gripped the edge of the box. He marshalled his strength from somewhere deep inside of himself. He intended to try and roll his body over the edge of the box allowing his legs to drop so that he could land on his feet. He prayed his legs would hold him. He heaved up and threw his right leg over the edge of the box just as his right arm gave way again. Helplessly he tumbled out of the box landing flat on his back on the hard cold floor, the stone was freezing to his naked flesh. His head snapped back on lax muscles cracking hard on the floor. Stars exploded in Bowden’s skull, his limp arms and legs slapped painfully onto the flagstones. He lay there winded eyes screwed shut in pain.
“Shit and Bloody Hellfire,” he grunted.
He couldn’t move, dare not move, he felt as if he had broken every bone in his body, including his skull. After a short time Bowden allowed his eyes to open on a world of pain. He groaned, feeling sick. Between the pain and the icy stone floor he wondered if it might have been better to have remained in the box. He didn’t know if he had any more strength left but he did know that he could not remain on the floor, he’d end up with bloody pneumonia. Even now his naked body was bunching into gooseflesh. Bowden reached out, his fingers curling round a firm protuberance coming from the base of the box. Grunting he pulled himself into a sitting position, his head hung limply on his chest, his breathing hard. Bowden was amazed that his bones weren’t broken after all.
Next step.
He had to get to his feet. Allowing his head to loll backwards he looked up towards the edge of the box, a million miles above him. Strangely Bowden began to feel he was getting stronger as if all this activity was somehow revitalizing him.
Taking his weight onto his hands Bowden rolled over onto his knees, the gritty stone floor took its toll as he shifted his weight from his hands to his legs and reached up. He hung onto the side of the box, his arms, once again, taking the weight. He raised one knee, placing his foot squarely on the floor, the other followed suit. Using his arms and legs in unison Bowden heaved himself upright. He swayed unsteadily for a second, clutching for the edge of the box for support. Bowden thought he was going to pass out, he felt lightheaded, nauseous. Teeth gritted he refused to give in. He fought back, taking huge gulps of air, the dizziness began to subside. He still felt weak as a newborn baby. His body was sheathed in clammy sweat; it irritated his scalp, pooled in his armpits, trickled down his sides.
After a few more moments Bowden had the strength to turn around and for the first time saw the room properly. It was very long, the far end shrouded in shadow where the low wattage bulbs could not penetrate. What light there was, glinted off a row of metallic coffin-like boxes, eight of them, all in a row, marching off into the gloom. Bowden’s made nine. Closer inspection of the nearest box showed that the coffin-like analogy was eerily apt, except the boxes looked more like Egyptian sarcophagi, made out of chromed steel rather than gold and stone. The tubes and piping covering the boxes snaked across a short distance to the wall disappearing into a small monitoring device of some sort, fitted to the wall about four feet from the floor.
Glancing to the left Bowden saw the device that monitored his box. It was fronted by several dials, each read zero, a row of soft red lights glowed on the top side of the box. The corresponding lights on the other boxes were black, except one three boxes down from where he stood, which glowed green.
“What the Hell is this place?” Bowden breathed, pleased to hear he had regained his voice, croaky though it was.
He lurched away from the box taking a few staggering steps to the middle of an aisle running the whole length of the room. His body felt loose, his legs like jelly. Bowden maintained his balance with difficulty with much arm waving and swaying torso. His co-ordination was shot; several times he nearly crashed to the floor, keeping himself upright by sheer willpower and determination.
There was no exit behind him, so Bowden figured it must be at the far end of the room, hidden in the gloom. It looked so far away, he had grave doubts about making it to the end. Haltingly he began the long trek, passing the silent, gleaming coffins one by one. The cold chilled his bare feet; the wall was equally cold under his supporting hand. Slowly the end of the room drew nearer. Bowden was now able to see a vague outline emerging from the shadows, shining dully in the meagre light. Dripping sweat, his legs like rubber, Bowden finally reached the door. Barely able to stand he made the last effort to get to the door, his strength flowed from him like water.
The door was brushed steel, cold and unyielding; there were no knobs or handles visible. A small electronic lock was situated on the left-hand side of the jamb. Bowden needed a swish card to get out.
“Bollocks,” he groaned wearily.
His legs suddenly gave out and he hit the floor hard on his rump, snapping his teeth together with jarring force. He grunted again. His senses were swimming in and out of reality, his strength totally gone as he slumped against the metal door. The lights blurred as he looked at them through a veil of water. He felt himself tipping over into a deep dark abyss.
Sliding down the door, oblivious when his cheek smacked the hard concrete, blackness rushed up for him, a perfect sheet of darkness enveloping him. Defeated Bowden allowed it to close over him and as it did, so he was sure he heard a hissing in his ears and was dimly aware that the door had slid open.
