MORE BLOOD!
The power of the command was physical, surging through his veins, tightening his muscles and hammering through his bones to the marrow. He gripped the screwdriver tight, his hand trembling as somewhere in his brain, a faint beacon of self-preservation battled the dark thoughts that had almost consumed him.
GIVE ME BLOOD!
The creaky floorboard flexed visibly as the voice in Jonny’s head reached a skull-splitting crescendo, sweeping asunder any final vestige of rebellion, the handyman screaming wildly as he plunged the screwdriver deep into his knee, twisting and gouging, fresh blood pouring from the gaping wound and soaking into the floorboards as if they were made of sponge.
*
Margaret Brown had been dozing fitfully on the sofa until the screams from the adjoining apartment woke her up. She immediately thrust her hands to her head, the throbbing at her temples now worse than ever. She decided that if she was no better in the morning she would go and see the doctor.
Another bout of screaming made her sit up.
What on earth was going on in there, she thought. Should she call the police? What if it was just an overly loud TV?
The elderly woman hated the thought of wasting police time – especially if it was just a TV left on in an empty apartment and they had to bash the door down…
The shrieking from next door started afresh, the noise banging into her throbbing skull like a pneumatic-drill.
“For Christ’s sake!”
She shouted at the adjoining wall as she pounded her fists against it, suddenly stopping as she realised she had blasphemed for the first time in goodness knows how long.
Oh, this blessed headache…
She pressed her palms hard against her temples and sank to her knees, gazing longingly at the picture of her late husband through welling tears of frustration.
*
The pain in Jonny’s leg was excruciating but he was powerless to stop himself inflicting even more damage. The dark eyes in the floorboard held him in their gaze, urging him on to spill more of his life-force. He watched, disconnected, as his blood was drawn into the wood, the floorboard seeming to pulse as if it was literally drinking its fill of the dark red fluid.
The bedroom suddenly echoed with a loud bang, as cracks snaked across the magnolia walls. Jonny shook his head, the spell broken for a second and the handyman sensed his chance at freedom. Adrenaline surged through his veins, masking the agony in his knee as he ran for the front door. Tugging on the handle, he felt resistance, as if the door was on a powerful spring, pulling against him, but his hormone-fuelled energy was superior and he staggered onto the landing as the door slammed shut behind him. He headed for the stairs, gripping the hand-rail tight as the initial surges of adrenaline began to fade, the pain in his leg burning with a renewed vigour, threatening to send him crashing. As he stumbled down the last few steps, he forced himself across the communal hallway, almost diving at the white button to the left of the doors which would open the locks.
Jonny yanked at the handle but the door remained closed. He jabbed at the switch repeatedly, listening for the soft ‘thunk’ which would indicate the latch had been released but heard nothing.
Again he tugged at the handle.
Again the door refused to budge.
Frantic, Jonny turned and looked at the staircase, as if waiting for some unseen force to slowly descend, like a scene from a horror movie, but his focus on the stairs was purely for his own benefit, something for his mind to latch onto. Deep inside he knew the unseen force was not coming down the stairs; it was in the stairs – and in the walls and floors and doors. It was all around him in the very structures of the building. And it was closing in, the sense of being disconnected beginning to cloud his mind once more, as if he were watching events unfold through a dirty window.
To his left, at the foot of the stairs, the door to the store room suddenly sprang open.
He didn’t want to go. He knew that if he entered that room he would never leave, but the voice was in his head again, whispering this time; almost soothing.
As if watching a character on a TV screen and just as helpless to interfere, Jonny’s dislocated mind looked on as he stepped slowly through the door.
20
Roger woke.
For a few, fleeting seconds, until his brain had booted up, he felt fully refreshed, fully relaxed – both physically and mentally.
He rose from the battered sofa and collapsed to the floor. Every part of his body hurt, every muscle throbbed. On hands and knees, he crawled through to the kitchen and used the table to haul himself to his feet, leaning over Bob’s bloated corpse for a few minutes, allowing whatever strength he had to solidify the jelly in his calves and thighs.
His belly growled loudly. He was starving. He couldn’t remember his last meal and his eyes scoured the kitchen looking for something to eat. In the yellowed fridge, he found a block of cheese and greedily bit off a chunk. There was an open pack of streaky bacon on the shelf below it, but after inspecting Bob’s collection of filthy pans, he couldn’t bring himself to cook anything. The stench of Bob’s shit on the floor was also starting to turn his stomach and, looking out of the grimy
