‘I expected to find you here, once I realized you were loose in the building.’ Rama entered the library, still silhouetted, pie still in hand. Wearing just the knee-length T-shirt she slept in, she approached, remorseless, somehow filling Danny’s entire field of vision.
He thought of the concrete slabs in her gym, smashed to smithereens by countless bludgeoning karate blows. Each slab, in his mind’s eye, now had his face. ‘And what if you have found me?’ he bluffed, rising to his feet. ‘Do you think I’m scared of you?’ Mind racing, he hurled his swivel chair across the floor at her. Its castors rattled across polished tiles.
She slung the chair aside, unfazed. It rebounded from a wall and into a book case. ‘I think you find me intimidating beyond belief. So you’d better do as you’re told.’
‘Never.’
She drew closer. ‘Then, I’ll have to use force.’
A wall stopped his retreat, forcing him to sidle along it, trying to find a point of escape. Now he was backed into a corner. ‘You think you can take me?’ he challenged.
She closed in. ‘I know I can take you.’
‘Oh dear. I simply can’t look.’ Doors’ camera light blinked off.
Danny tried selling her a dummy. It didn’t work. Her forearm pinned him against the wall. And she held him there, steely fingers gripping a handful of his skin through his T-shirt. ‘Open your mouth, Gary. Eat this pie.’ She tried cramming it into his mouth. It brushed his lips.
He kept them shut, moving his head away. ‘Never.’
‘Eat it.’ She tried again.
Again he moved his head away. ‘You won’t get away with this.’
‘Eat it.’
‘I have friends.’
‘Name one.’
‘A frightening girl with green hair. She knows where I am. She’ll miss me – whoever she is. Maybe she’s my girlfriend. Maybe she loves me. Maybe she’s wondering where I am right now. She’ll … she’ll …’
‘She’ll what?’
‘She’ll …’ He didn’t know.
‘Gary, I’m not going to hurt you. This pie will restore your memory.’
‘Yeah,’ he sneered. ‘Sure it will. And I suppose it’ll also cure my, my, that problem I once had.’
‘Erection, Gary. The word is erection, E-R-E-C-T-I-O-N. How many times must I tell you? In fact, it’ll restore that problem but will at least cure your amnesia.’
‘You expect me to believe that? My God, I knew you were evil but is there no depth you won’t sink to? Even now you won’t tell the truth.’
‘Gary, the pies can only clear your memory once. Now you’ve rediscovered your encounter with the monster, that memory can’t be re-wiped without using enough drugs to melt your brain into a particularly unpleasant sludge. And I for one have no intention of standing here watching your hippocampus leak from your ears.’
‘That’s exactly what you want to see.’
‘And why should I want to see that?’
‘To shut me up.’
‘The thought is tempting.’
‘So you admit it?’
‘Yes! I admit it. I’m the most evil woman on Earth, and I’m only after your body – and any other nonsense that mixed-up head of yours wants to believe. I’m an alien, here to drink your brain. Now eat the fucking pie.’ Again she pushed it at him.
He broke free, running for the exit, feet heavy as in a dream. The door seemed to be getting no nearer though he knew it must have been. If he could get to that, shut and lock it from the outside, he could call the police and get her put away like she deserved.
‘Doors,’ she ordered.
Slam! A metal panel dropped down, blocking the exit. Danny pounded it, feeling betrayed by the one ‘person’ he’d trusted; ‘Doors! Doors! Let me out!’
‘Doors won’t help you. Regardless of unreliability, it’s essentially spineless. I designed it that way.’
‘I’m sorry, Mr Daniel.’
‘And stop calling him Mr Daniel,’ she snapped. ‘His name’s Gary. How many times must I tell you?’
‘Sorry, Miss Rama.’ Doors sounded almost in tears.
Danny turned to face her, back pressed against the metal panel, heart pounding as she drew nearer.
She told Doors, ‘You and I are going to have a long talk after this. And my talking will be done with screwdrivers.’
‘Yes, Miss Rama.’
Danny looked to either side for potential weapons. He’d have to belt her one to escape. Maybe when she was unconscious. Doors would disobey her again. But what could he hit her with?
On the shelf by his head sat Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, just asking to knock someone senseless. Danny grabbed it, ready to deliver the knockout blow that would end this insanity.
Thwack!
Everything went black.