The octagon box set, p.13
The Octagon Box Set, page 13
part #1 of The Octagon Series
Next stop was the med lab where they all had biometric probes inserted into their necks. Artes explained that these tiny probes would transmit all their telemetry back to a base station for constant monitoring. Even their biometric data now belonged to someone else.
Artes also quickly quashed the idea of anyone in the group killing another. It seemed Maddox was the likely first candidate to break that rule. The way he stared at Kobe gave him no doubt that the first chance Maddox had, maybe in the communal shower, maybe whilst eating in the dining hall, he would to slip a knife into Kobe’s gut or snap his neck.
The rule was very clear. You kill another, they kill you all. If one person killed another in the group, then all of them would be immediately terminated. It was like self-regulation. It was smart. Get each other to act as guardians of the group in the name of self-preservation.
Despite the rule, they were still transferred to separate containment cells that night. During all other times, they would eat, train, and shower together. Except for Petra. She had her own separate shower facilities. Mind you, if the smart money was on Maddox being the first to attempt to bump off someone, a certain raven-haired girl with panache for hacksaws would run a close second. Several times Kobe had caught her assessing Celus with her cold, calculating eyes. Kobe could almost see her pupils dilate when the group was told about his depraved past.
Kobe was resigned to his fate. Everyone in the group had to be or would soon come around to that fact. If not, then they would be subject to the same corporate-sanctioned murder as Lukas.
He felt so lonely now, sitting on the floor, the anguish threatening to swallow him. There was no way out. They were all going to die.
In the muted light from the barred window, Kobe noticed a blemish on the concrete. He swept away some of the dirt, revealing a dull reddish-brown patch.
Blood.
5
They sat on rough-hewn benches in the dining hall. A scatter of half-eaten meal trays were in front of them, a high-protein and high-carb diet so that they could build muscle and would have enough fuel to burn and sustain the punishing daily training sessions. The mood was somber. No one felt like eating except Maddox, who had piled his tray and sat shoveling food into his mouth like it was the last supper.
Petra kept her distance, preferring to sit a few seats away, distancing herself from the group but still listening to the conversation. Kobe stole a sideways glance, and despite her being absorbed in pushing around lumps of egg white on her tray, she was listening but not making a show of it.
Celus, after being threatened by Artes the day before in the training square, had become withdrawn and just sat morosely drinking coffee. The sudden and shocking execution of Lukas the drug dealer had hit them all hard, except, of course, Maddox. To him, it meant one less competitor getting to the summit of the Pinnacle. The threat was now very real and deadly. If they didn’t obey, they would be swiftly executed.
Jin, who seemed to have drunk too much coffee, was the most talkative, wanting to know what everyone thought and how they were going to escape. His chatty and exuberant manner masked the stress and anxiety he felt deep down after spending an hour in the shower block scrubbing off the remnants of Lukas’s head.
“Listen,” Jin said, his eyes darting from side to side, concerned if their conversations were being recorded. “On the ride in, I was in an air transport. We flew over a part of the island. I saw this huge installation maybe ten miles south of here. We could make it to there and get help.”
Maddox, with his mouth full of food, looked at Jin incredulously. “What, are you freaking crazy? Get help! Who the hell from? This whole island is owned and run by Octagon. The only thing you are going to find there are more Enforcers with more guns.”
Ignoring Maddox, Kobe leaned in, conscious of the three Enforcers standing guard. He was keen to know what Jin had seen from the air. “What exactly did this place look like?”
Jin went on to describe the installation. It was made up of several connected buildings, each the size of a large aircraft hanger. There was one larger building with several smokestacks, each gushing out a greyish haze of discharge into the air.
It bothered Kobe how Jin was allowed to see all this from the air. They’d all been transported in separately, and the rest had seen nothing.
“Have you noticed that strange smell in the air at night?” Jin continued. “It’s like rotten meat.”
Kobe glanced at Petra. She was still listening but not with her eyes. “What else was there?” Kobe went on.
“There were these huge outdoor pens, like what you hold cattle in. Just miles and miles of paddocks, all fenced in,” Jin replied.
“Well, there’s you answer,” Maddox interrupted, chewing his food like some kind of feral animal feeding on a carcass he had just killed. “Cattle.”
“Cattle?” Jin said.
“Yeh,” Maddox replied, lifting up his fork with a spiked piece of grey meat on the end of it. “Fresh meat, being killed and cooked.” He smiled, putting the fork into his mouth, chewing on the meat with relish. “That’s what the place was, a slaughterhouse. Where do you think your food comes from? They need to feed the population. It takes a lot of cattle for that to happen. What Jin saw was probably one of the food processing plants Octagon runs.”
Kobe thought about this. It would make sense. Octagon controlled all manufacturing and distribution. There wasn’t exactly an abundance of meat available for the population, but there was more now than what there had been before the corporate takeover happened.
“What about the reconditioning?” Jin asked no one in particular. “Why weren’t we sent to reconditioning? Isn’t that what this place is supposed to be about?”
Jin said he never saw any other buildings or installations on the island. But he admitted he had only flown only over a small part of Exile on his trip in.
“Maybe the reconditioning facility is on another part of the island, some place we haven’t seen yet,” Celus added, looking up from his coffee cup, cradled in his hands, his face sullen and drawn.
Every time he looked at Celus, Kobe saw nothing but deadness behind his eyes, like there was nothing there. He couldn’t imagine what horrors those dark eyes had absorbed, like portals into the underworld, raping some poor young child, his body slithering over their smaller body in the vilest of acts imaginable. It was taking every effort for Kobe not to grab a fork from his tray and stab Celus repeatedly in the neck. Sure, Maddox had killed people, ended their lives. But Celus had destroyed the lives of others who would go on to live for decades, feeling dead on the inside. The animal that was sitting at the same table as him was scum, filth, the worst kind of offender.
Ignoring Celus, Kobe prodded Jin for more information. “But you saw no cattle, right?”
“No. Maybe they had already been killed and were just in getting processed by then.” Jin shrugged. “Look, I’ve hacked into a few of Octagon’s servers, and I’ve seen some strange stuff. Things that don’t make sense. I’ve also spoken to a few other hackers online and they’ve told me weird shit, things that they have discovered.”
“Like what?” Maddox looked up from his food tray.
“Do any of you know anyone who has been reconditioned?” Jin asked. “Have you actually spoken to anyone who has returned from here?”
The blank looks around the table spoke the answer. No one, including Kobe, knew anyone personally who had returned from reconditioning. He just knew it happened and it was law. But Kobe hadn’t actually met someone who had been sent to Exile. He had never seen again any of the offenders he and De Soto had apprehended who later were sent here.
“What about you?” Jin said to Kobe. “You’ve arrested offenders. Surely you know what happens to them. You must have come across a past offender who went through rehabilitation?”
Kobe looked around the table. Even Petra had looked up and was now looking at him, waiting for his answer.
“I don’t know what happens to them. All I know is that once they have been tagged with a Reconditioning Order, the BPO takes care of the rest,” Kobe said. Most of the offenders he had arrested were kept in holding facilities, waiting to be transported here to Exile. He had seen them, with his own eyes, but not after that.
“Don’t you think it’s strange?” Jin said. “I know people who have been sent to Exile, but I never see them again. It’s like they just vanish.”
Kobe felt torn. He knew people were reconditioned and released back into society. That was the whole idea behind what Octagon had created. They closed all the prisons and created a state-of-the-art rehabilitation program that had a near perfect success rate. This was what he had been told at the Academy. He had watched the promotional videos, showing happy, adjusted graduates of Exile, assimilated back into society. It was the truth. Kobe knew it.
6
Bending over, Kobe vomited onto the ground. He could feel his stomach constrict in spasms that retched out tepid, opaque fluid tinged with yellowish bile. There was nothing left to throw up now, except the water he had drunk earlier that morning, when he started his twenty-mile trek.
He had pushed himself too hard and was now racked with waves of nausea. He stood up, wiped his mouth on his arm, took his canteen from his belt and washed out the remnants of the vomit from his mouth, spitting it out in a sour swill.
The morning sun filtered through the tall pines above and dappled the forest floor around him in shades of olive and brown. The air was still cool, fringed with the musty smell of leaves, wood and the rich undergrowth. The running trail Kobe was following curved away through the dense foliage of bracken, coarse ferns and twisted branches. Kobe had no idea where the others were as he scanned the forest around him. They had started off after a quick breakfast with just a light day pack on their backs, water and dry food to eat.
Kobe took a moment to get his bearings, enjoying the feeling of the cool air on his face and the welcomed retreat of the nausea that seemed to be passing. He needed to take it slower. Once again he’d thought because he was young he could outrun the others and show them youth over experience.
They were given a starting point on the course that began near the base of the Pinnacle within the area where the Pinnacle Trial would actually occur. The entire area was enclosed by a tall electric fence that would fry them in seconds if they breached it. They had just six hours to complete the loop and arrive back at the start. Anyone late would be left behind by the transport to walk back to the compound.
Despite not being able to see the Pinnacle through the dense pines, Kobe could feel its ominous presence looming down on him like some brooding giant, always there in the background.
This was just the first week of their training and already Kobe was preoccupied with the trial they all had to face in a few weeks. What if he failed? What would happen to him or the others? Even though he was stuck with a bunch of criminals, Kobe didn’t accept the immediate execution of any of them. They deserved their chance at rehabilitation and assimilating back into society. Even Maddox did, provided he was capable of rehabilitation. Celus was another matter altogether. Kobe, no matter how hard he tried, couldn’t accept the sins of that man. Celus felt no remorse for his disgusting acts on children. He was sick. He had a disease that by his own candid admission was insatiable and unrelenting. No, in Kobe’s mind, Celus could not be reformed. The seed of his evil lay buried too deep. The afterlife beckoned him, and Kobe had a feeling that Petra may oblige with sending Celus on his way. This was Kobe’s fear: Petra killing Celus then Artes executing all of them.
Kobe tightened the straps on his backpack and set off along the trail again in a light run. This time, he would pace himself, even though he could feel himself getting fitter and stronger in just a few short days.
The training was punishing. Up at dawn each morning for a light five-mile run to stretch out tired and sore muscles. Then the rest of the morning was spent on various combat drills under the watchful eyes of Artes. He would give intense instruction, making sure they first grasped the fundamentals and best application for each weapon. Maddox didn’t care what weapon he had. He could kill someone with just his bare hands, and probably had in the past. But that would change when your opponent was equipped with any one of the nasty weapons from the armory.
The trident was best used as a defensive weapon, for keeping at distance someone who was more skilled with a sword than you. Celus took an instant liking to the trident. He was awkward and clumsy with any of the bladed weapons. The trident allowed him to keep his distance or retreat then counter with a lunging stab to his opponent’s body. At times, during the sparring drills, Celus retreated very quickly, allowing his opponent to overrun their position and lose balance. He would then steam forward and re-engage, often catching his opponent off guard, then ram the blunted barbs of his practice trident into their torso. Kobe has a nice cluster of bruises dotting his abdomen attesting to this. Kobe knew he was a sneaky bastard, preferring to lie in wait for his prey to come to him, like a trap door spider.
Maddox on the other hand was completely insane, steamrolling forward like a locomotive, relying on his size, muscle and sheer brute force to bludgeon his opponents into submission. Even though they used blunted practice weapons, Maddox had broken nearly all his practice swords from the heavy blows he had mercilessly rained down on each opponent. He then switched to a double-edged axe. Petra had opted to wear a breastplate during her bouts, but that didn’t stop Maddox from putting a crack in it, at the apex of her shoulder. Her collarbone would have been smashed by the practice axe otherwise. Needless to say, no one wanted to be paired with Maddox during the armed combat sessions. For Maddox, it wasn’t training, it was war from the start. He approached every session like he was fighting for his life. He didn’t want to practice. He wanted to crush his opponents into the dust of the training square.
Wild-eyed, screaming at the top of his lungs like a man possessed by the devil himself, he would lumber after his opponent, swinging his axe. It was an ugly and dangerous weapon he’d taken a liking to, and when they first entered the armory cage, Maddox was like a kid in a candy shop. Like a magnet, he was hypnotized and immediately drawn to the double-edged battle axe, because it looked like it could do the most damage to the human body. Maddox became very proficient in its use very quickly, a natural choice Artes said, and he couldn’t wait for the time he could get his hands on the real killing version of the weapon. These versions remained under lock and key in the armory, snug in their racks.
Petra preferred the short sword. She wanted to get in your face, up close, within your guard, and cut you to ribbons. Under Artes’s tutelage, she too became proficient with her weapon of choice. A bunch of killers no doubt could master any type of weapon if given enough time, Kobe thought.
Jin was another story. He was hopeless with most of the weapons, except maybe the trident. In most of the drills, he looked clumsy and timid.
Rounding a curve on the trail, Kobe came up on a clump of waist-high boulders. He paused and sat down for a quick rest. Unzipping his backpack, he pulled out a small vacuum-sealed bag of nuts and dried fruit. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast, and now with an empty stomach and the nausea gone, he could feel the hollowness from his energy reserves dwindling. The forest floor all around him moved with birds, bush turkeys and ground animals. The wind picked up and rustled the branches above that provided shade from the harsh midday sun.
The wind carried something else as well. It was just a strand, a ribbon of an odor, but Kobe smelt it. Jin had mentioned the smell of rotten meat carried on the evening breeze, but after the first night, they were all transferred to the barracks and there was no smell again.
Kobe looked around. The odor was faint, not overpowering but still unmistakable. It had a meaty rankness to it, like a dead animal carcass turning putrid in the sun.
Moving off the boulder, Kobe strapped on his backpack again and tried to pinpoint the direction the smell was coming from. The trail snaked on past the boulders and the terrain sloped away into a wall of dense undergrowth on one side. It wasn’t a good idea to waste time, but something gnawed at Kobe’s instincts. He could afford a few extra minutes just to see if the scent was close and locate its source. Coming off the trail, Kobe followed the slope down into the undergrowth and came to a shallow gully, spooned out like a dried-out creek bed. Small rocks dotted the edge where the soil had eroded and the air was slightly cooler.
All that Kobe could hear was the unrelenting buzz of the insects, a noise that never stopped, day or night. Kobe crossed the gully then climbed the embankment of the other side, pulling himself up on an exposed tree root. At the top, Kobe paused again, hesitant. Maybe this was a bad idea.
In every direction, the trees spread in a maze of camouflaged trunks, foliage and plants. The insect noise stopped and the forest went deathly quiet. Looking over his shoulder, back the way he had just come, Kobe could see the ridge of the other side of the creek bed where he had ventured off the trail. Should he go back? It wasn’t that far, but for some reason, the atmosphere down here felt different, almost ominous. There was an eeriness that permeated the surrounding trees, enveloping him. The hair on the back of Kobe’s neck tingled.
Then suddenly he heard it. It was like a humming, a human sound. The rank smell was stronger now. Kobe was close. The sun above filtered through the forest canopy, making it gloomy. Ahead, there was a slight part in the trees, where the light was brighter. The smell and the humming were coming from just ahead, through the trees. Step by step, Kobe edged closer, tenderly placing one foot down so as to not snap or break a twig or branch. He reached the part in the undergrowth where the light above shone down into a small clearing, and paused behind a broad trunk, one hand resting on the rough, woody bark.
The insects had returned now, the air thick with their hissing.
