The Hideout

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. Rowland crouched by the un-lit fireplace, ice-cold and shaking from shock after her midnight dash through Bungonia Forrest, she fumbled the matches again and again.

“Damn it” Rowland cursed her shivering hands. She had to get warm. And calm down. Abandoning the damp meagre firewood and the ancient box of matches, she took up the candle from the window sill and scanned the cottage. Memories of earlier that evening still pulsed in her brain with a ferocious persistence, making it hard to think straight... to formulate a plan. She was safe for now, but she would eventually be found. She needed a plan. Willing herself to focus, Rowland took stock;

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Kitchen – a handful of unspent ammunition scattered on the bench. A rifle bag on the floor. No gun. Cupboard door ajar, wretched from their hinges… Unhinged. Unhinged. Like Smith, when he lunged at her, a wild-eyed blur of uniform and blood lust. Rowland grabbed at her head willing it to push the violent image away.

Dining table – One leg missing, the remain three cocooned in spiderwebs, bound to the cottage like prisoners… Prisoners. Running through the woods, legs heavy and uncooperative … quick-sand slow, the nightmare where you can’t run, and your screams pour out in a silent scream. Rowland spun around on the spot, working her legs just to assure herself she could. The candle flame fluttered uncertainly, nearly extinguished with the rush of air from the pirouette. Rowland stilled herself and cradled the light source protectively until the flame restored its rhythmic flicker.

Lounge – A sofa and two armchairs. All three pieces threadbare and springs emerging, no doubt the hotbed of many teenage party nights. The secrets they must keep! Secrets!... Secrets. Undo! Undo! Undo! her mind screamed in response to each intrusive thought, but this wasn’t a game and there was no reset button. This was real and the finality of her actions… Smith, the others, the yard… none of it could be undone. Rowland wailed out loud before clasping her mouth. She couldn’t stop her fresh new secret from punching through her brain. It’s truth too loud, too urgent, to be repressed. Panic and hopelessness hit her chest once again, knocking air from her lungs and forcing a strangled gasp from her mouth that sounded distant and foreign to Rowlands ears. Like a baby on the edge of exhaustion, sobbing a final cry for help before shutting its eyes. Rowland clenched her eyes shut and willed the images away.

Hallway – A elaborate timber chest sitting next to a barren coast rack. “Addison” was etched into the lid copperplate lettering, almost blending into the ornate carvings covering the entire trunk. An unnecessarily large padlock hung on the clasp. Locked. Locked! Locked like the prison. Guards and prisoners alike. There was no good guys and bad guys. No real inside and outside once you were part of that hell.

Once inside, they were all Unhinged. Prisoners. Secrets. Locked.

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But Rowland had found a way to “unlock” herself tonight. Not that she had a choice. Smith had forced her hand. Out of one prison and straight into another – one she may never be able to leave. Rowland snapped out of her dark fugue and returned her attention to the chest – possibly a blanket box, holder of overcoats and bed socks if luck was on her side. Being in the system for as long as she had, Rowland had the skills to beat a simple padlock, but just needed the tools. She wished desperately that this was a game or movie (Undo! Restart!) where no doubt she would be afforded the cliché of gracefully retrieving a bobby pin from her hair, but the absence of any such accessories brought home the reality of her situation once more.

Scanning the shadows of the small cabin, Rowland settled on a sofa spring and snapped off a coil at a particularly rusted point. Reshaping the aged wire in her still-trembling hand, she set to work on the lock. Though imposing, the lock proved to be ornamental and required no finesse to pop.

Shucking off her still wet uniform – oh how she hated that coarse monochrome thing, even more so now it bore evidence of the nights’ horrors - Rowland stood naked in the capricious light of the solitary candle. She rummaged through the trunk, hoping for a jacket, a jumper, some winter outwear that Mr or Mrs Addison had left behind for future hunting trips perhaps. Layers of soft wadding met her fingers. Not a blanket, more like packing foam but warm enough.

Rowland snatched at the soft sheeting and threw it up and over her shoulders, eager to cape herself in the warm fabric. The candle wavered desperately against the sudden gust of wind from Rowland brandishing the padded cloth, and then the flame blinked out.

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The last thing Rowland saw before the cabin fell dark, was the powdery white skin and dead black eyes of a porcelain doll staring up at her from the trunk.

And then voices erupted. From the woods. Urgent and enraged.

… Mr and Mrs Addison back from hunting?

… Smith?

… The others from the prison?

… There was no good guys and bad guys. No real ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ once you were part of that hell…

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Adrenaline surged though her yet again, making her head buzz and her thoughts blur.

“Oh God, they are here! I’m-dead-I’m-dead-I’m-dead. I can’t be here. I can’t. They can’t find me. I’ve got to…” Rowland muttered out loud to the darkness,

“Hide? Do you want to hide?” The darkness whispered back.

Silence inside the cabin. Raised voices growing closer in the woods. Distance footsteps now audible.

“Do you want to hide?” The darkness whispered again.

A soft, warm glow rose from the doll’s lifeless eyes, casting the cabin into a muted sunrise-like light. The doll grasped a silver rattle tightly in one tiny white hand, but the other hand wriggled fat fingers in Rowlands direction.

“Do you want to hide?” The doll whispered, a pouty red mouth curled playfully.

Numb with fear and confusion, Rowland stared at the doll in the trunk.

“Y.. Yes” Rowland said instinctively, her rational mind now unavailable for consult.

“Hold my hand” Addison said.

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Rowland opened her eyes to perfect pitch blackness.

She tried to reach out to feel her surrounds, but she couldn’t.

Darkness, silence and stillness cocooned her (spiderwebs around a table leg), so pervasive that it was hard to remember that senses ever existed.

Except feel and touch. She could still feel.

Rowland could still feel the acute panic and terror - as the events that brought her to this hideout flashed through her mind again and again. And she could feel cold, smooth steel in her left hand.

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