LIFERS Chapter Fifty One

Marianna followed her grandmother at the back of the line as they turned into the tunnel that would take them to the cinema. She hitched-up the girl she was carrying and looked at the one Ella had.

‘Thank you for going back for them,’ she said.

Ella stopped, allowed the others to continue without them. She turned to Marianna. ‘Regardless of how black your mother may have painted me, I am not the monster you think I am.’

‘That’s a rather contradictory thing to say, considering what goes on here.’

‘Went on here,’ Ella corrected. ‘And I can’t say that you’re wrong about that, but had there been another alternative…’ She set off again. ‘Come, we need to catch up with the rest.’

Two paces later, Marianna tripped and almost dropped the girl she carried; Ella swung her flashlight round and both looked to see two mud-smeared boulders.

‘These tunnels are weak,’ Ella said. ‘That explosion you felt must have dislodged them.’

Marianna thought it strange that two large rocks of similar size had been shaken from the tunnel’s wall and no other, smaller rocks, grit, or stone had worked loose. She took the flashlight and was about to crouch to inspect one of them.

‘I feel very uncomfortable at being in here, Marianna, so can we please move on now?’

Marianna handed back the flashlight and followed her grandmother to the end of the tunnel and up some wooden steps, and when they were all in the cinema, Ella told one of them to go behind the screen and throw the switch for the lighting.

The voices of those present ceased and the auditorium became filled with a peculiar silence, an eerie silence, a silence Marianna felt rather uncomfortable with.

‘Something’s wrong,’ she said.

‘Yes, I know, but it’s a wrong I’ve chosen to accept.’

Just as Ella finished that sentence, another explosion sounded, this time inside the tunnel they just climbed from. Dust and rubble flew from the open hatch and two men pushed past Marianna to go check it out, but on reaching the bottom of the steps, one of them shouted to say the tunnel had been blocked.

..

All of this was a clever ruse conjured up by that investigator and now they were ensnared by the rain and a blocked tunnel. Ella had a feeling that very soon they would all be in custody.

Some of them asked about the explosion but she saw no point in explaining the forthcoming inevitability of the situation, she offered them no answer. Instead, she told them to sit and await her instructions, which they did. At that, the auditorium was illuminated and the people took a few seconds to adjust to the change in light.

Marianna put down the girl she carried but kept hold of her hand. ‘Why have we been forced into the cinema?’ she said.

‘We’re being rounded up.’

‘Rounded up?’

‘Like I said earlier; there’s a private investigator out there who’s been manipulating this situation, and now he has us trapped and ready to be arrested once he gets the authorities out here.’

‘If that was the case why not bring the authorities to the town hall where you were already penned in?’ Marianna looked about the place. ‘This is more than a round-up; whatever it is he has planned for you, I doubt the authorities will have anything to do with it.’

Ella thought about Marianna’s theory, thought about the fire and the explosions, thought about the investigator’s tenacity. And then it dawned on her that Marianna could be right; this was too elaborate a plan just to get them where he wanted them, especially if only for capture. If having them arrested was his idea he’d have to go for help, he’d have to leave Martinsville to bring back the authorities, and by then the rain would have stopped and all of them would be out of there. So, in order for his plan to come to fruition, it would have to reach that point before the rain stopped.

‘Marianna, you may be right,’ she said, then looked about for more explosive devices. ‘Take the girls and get yourself and them out of here, now.’

..

Marianna was about to take the second girl when a loud crash came from the back of the cinema. Many voices screamed out as a huge truck shattered seats either side of the centre aisle and crushed everything and everyone in its path. The truck’s relentless momentum sent it straight toward Marianna, Ella, and the girls.

Ella managed to push her young ward into Marianna’s arms as the front right side of the truck struck her. She put an arm out as an instinctive defence but was knocked to the floor where the front wheel rolled up her legs and came to a stop just below her chest.

Bits of wood and plaster and glass fell from the truck and landed on and around Ella. She reached out, tried to speak, but so much blood had already pooled in her mouth she coughed and covered her lower face and neck with it. Marianna forced the girls to look away as she knelt by her side.

‘Marianna,’ Ella said, more blood choking her words. ‘Decide what you will … with regard to your mother … but you … but you must remember … whatever you decide, that decision you alone will have to live with.’

Marianna took hold of her hand. ‘I know, grandmother, I know.’

But Ella didn’t hear the reply.

Marianna saw one corner of the UPS envelope sticking out from her grandmother’s dress pocket and pulled it free.

‘I know what I need to do now,’ she said, then stood to see the partially wrecked truck loom massive before her; she noticed many strange things attached to it, things she felt sure shouldn’t be there.

She turned and took a hand of each of the girls and made for an exit on the side wall but stopped when she saw the thick chain that held the two doors together. She looked back at the truck to see half a dozen small electronic boxes, each with a synchronised flashing red light, and all of which began to beep; five beeps later, the lights froze.

Time was up.

The crowd in the cinema ran around in panic, not knowing what to do or where to go. Marianna saw some of them trying to get back into the tunnel but a disorganised queue soon formed and more panic set in. She put the two girls one in front of the other against one of the thick wooden pillars and pushed down on their shoulders to make them sit then sat behind them. She wrapped her legs around both girls and pushed her feet up against the pillar, almost lying on top of them. She had no idea if she’d survive the blast or not, but she’d do her best to protect the girls from it.

She shuffled herself right up against them and, with her back to the truck, shouted, ‘Keep your heads down and cover your ears, now.’

Marianna did the same.