Remember Me

Remember Me.

Neil Hartley

Copyright N. Hartley 2012.

Do not reproduce or redistribute without express permission of the author.

Smashwords Edition

Prologue - Washed Up.

Ron Bower moaned and put his hands to his head. There seemed to be a tiny man inside his skull going mad with a hammer.

Ow, he said. Bugger.

His head wasn’t the only thing wrong though. He appeared to be sitting on something hard and uncomfortable. Then the rest of his body had noticed he’d gained consciousness, and starting to complain.

What the hell? He opened his eyes, wincing at the light that streamed in, agitating the little man inside his head, which redoubled the pounding.

Groaning, Ron sat upright and rubbed at his eyes, blinking rapidly as he looked around.

Where the hell am I? he muttered.

What it appeared to be was in some kind of launderette. Large, sickly coloured yellow washing machines lined the wall in front of him. The one directly opposite seemed to be the only one in use. A set of pink clothes tumbling about within.

What the fuck? He winced as he stood up, making a face of anguish as his back protested by spasming violently.

Leaning on the hard plastic chair he’d been asleep on, he tried to recall how he’d ended in the place, wherever it was. There was nothing. The last thing he could recall was having a beer in the Old Grouse with Trevor. After that it was just blank.

What the hell was in that beer? he muttered. He slumped back down in to the chair, and only then noticed he was wearing an unfamiliar suit made of some kind of revolting light blue material. Further investigation revealed he was also wearing a ludicrous pink silk shirt. His shoes were a horribly out of date patent leather design that exposed white nylon socks.

I’m the king of tack, he lamented.

The machine in front of him suddenly stopped, rolling to a halt with a dull thud. The sudden lack of noise from it allowed other noises to filter in. The hum of traffic, interspersed with the honk of the occasional car horn. Some kind of megaphone amplified voice shouted something that he couldn’t catch. He frowned. Sundersfield wasn’t that busy, what the hell was going on?

Peering over to his right he tried to catch a glimpse out of the front of the shop, past a fat Asian looking woman sitting several chairs down, busy prodding away at her phone. All he could make out were vague shapes of people walking past.

What? Ron realized the woman was speaking.

She pointed at the washing machine in front of him.

"Wan la," she repeated.

Ron pulled a face. Bloody foreigners, they could at least learn the language if they were going to live here. He shook his head. It’s not mine.

Ni de, she jabbed a fat finger again. Wan la, kui yi dian.

Jesus. May as well humour her, he thought. Plus there may be some clothes inside he could change into. Shaking his head, he stood slowly and creakily up and fumbled with the latch on the device. The instructions seemed to be in Japanese or something, but he figured it out in the end, just as several other women, busy chatting amongst themselves, entered the shop.

He swung the door open, and a short bald man, wearing a very unattractive, although clean, tracksuit fell out onto the floor.

Chapter 1 – New Sights.

Holy shit! Ron leapt backwards as the freshly cleaned man tumbled onto the floor, where he lay, soapy water slowly oozing out of his clothes.

Ignoring the screams of the women near the door for the moment, he knelt down and put two fingers on the neck of the stranger. Nothing. Of course, that could just mean he was doing it wrong, all he was going on here was several episodes of a TV show he’d watched recently, which hardly qualified him to work in the medical profession. Still, it was pretty likely being bounced around inside a launderette machine was going to have some fairly serious consequences.

He frowned. The man seemed somehow familiar.

His examination was cut short by a sharp jabbing to the shoulder, which turned out to be an umbrella wielded by one of the women that had recently entered. She poked him again and screamed away at him in some strange language, though from her expression it was easy to deduce that he was being blamed for the murder.

Murder! Ron jerked upright, avoiding another jab from the brolly.

Hey listen! he turned to face his accusers. There were three in the group, all middle aged ladies from their appearance. He couldn’t help noticing they were all Asian, and none of them were speaking, actually shouting, English.

"I don’t know this man! He pointed at the body. Me no know! You understand? Me not kill!" He made a stabbing gesture with his hand which, in hindsight, was probably not very calming.

The women shrieked again, the sound making Ron wince. Two of them pulled out phones and started dialing.

Fuck this! Ron quickly decided on a strategic withdrawal. Even though he was certain he was innocent, the whole thing would look better from a distance. Pushing the umbrella fiend out of his way he barged his way through the coven of evil and made his way towards the door.

And promptly tripped over the extended foot of the seated woman who’d spoken to him earlier. He twisted round to glare at her. She was still sitting there, phone in hand, though now she had an evil grin on her face which widened, showing dark brown teeth as she hissed out several words in perfect English:

Where is it?

Where’s what? Ron gasped, scrabbling to his feet. The whole thing had taken no more than about five seconds, but already the three women were bearing down on him, umbrellas leveled like lances on medieval knights. He didn’t wait for an answer, but fled, smashing the door open and flying out into a busy street.

Several bodies bounced of him as he barged into the crowd of pedestrians. He ignored the angry shouts and pummeled his way through the people.

Where the hell am I? he gasped to himself, nearly getting run over by an old man on a three wheeled bike, who was pedalling along the pavement despite the mass of population already inhabiting it.

Panting hard, he slowed his pace a little. The shouts had died behind him, and the number of people worked in his favor, masking him from his pursuers, if there were any.

Slowly details began to impinge upon his consciousness. A large blue bus, packed to the gills with people, narrowly missed him, some kind of inbuilt megaphone chastising him as it did so. The buildings rising above were tall and modern, with signs in either Chinese or Japanese, he wasn’t sure which. Indeed, all the people passing by were Asian. And there were a lot of them.

I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore Toto, Ron said to himself, pulling his horrible suit jacket about his body. Another point made itself apparent. It was cold.

Before he could work on this further, sirens made themselves heard over the noise of the crowd and traffic. He wasn’t sure if they were cop sirens, but the chance wasn’t something he wished to take.

Time to make myself scarcer, he said. Tucking his hands in his pockets, he marched into the crowd, head down whilst taking surreptitious glances form left to right, trying to adapt to his strange surroundings. Behind him he thought he heard shouts, but he couldn’t be sure.

Speeding up, he took a left turn onto a smaller, but still crowded, side street. The shops here were smaller too, and were still just as alien. He moved on, dodging the people meandering about in front of him, and crossed a street, nearly being run down by a large black Lexus in the process.

Jesus, these people are mad, he muttered, skipping forward to avoid being mown down by an electric bike driven by an tiny woman. A small child was sitting in a custom seat behind the driver. The kid gave him a strange look as the bike went by.

The sound of sirens filled his ears again, and he quickened his pace. He finally found a small alley which didn’t seem to be so busy, and he ducked down into it.

Working his way past several large metal containers that smelled of something disgusting, he crouched down behind a large wooden crate. The sirens grew louder, and then started to fade, only to be replaced by shouts and the sounds of people running.

Damn it! Ron swore, crunching down as much as possible behind the box.

He’s down there! he heard a man shout, followed by something in another language.

Two seconds later another man’s voice shouted something. It sounded short and to the point, and it didn’t take much imagination to translate it to: ‘Freeze!’

Ron weighed up the options, and risked a quick peek out from his hiding place. What he saw didn’t make him any happier. A group of men in what were undoubtedly police uniforms were making their way down the alley. The lead two had handguns, which darted back and forth as they advanced.

Give it up! Behind the police a shorter form in totally different garb stood and shouted out in English. Ron frowned and risked another peek out, which was a mistake.

The lead police officer, a tall wiry man, jumped on him and efficiently kneed him in the stomach.

Ron went down as the rest of the squad piled on, none to gently. He was kicked and punched in the ribs, and his face was forced onto the ground, which was none to clean.

The last thing he saw before he lost consciousness was a familiar looking short bald man in a pink track suit beaming down at him.

~

For the second time Ron woke up aching all over.

For the love of god, he moaned, and opened his eyes.

He was lying on the floor, the cold hard floor, of a small room which bore every semblance of an interrogation room. The lack of windows, the single wooden table in the center with two plain chairs at opposite sides, the plain concrete walls with no decoration, and the sturdy looking metal door with small grill inset all added to the general ambience.

Clutching at his ribs, which seemed to creak, he coughed roughly and pulled himself, painfully, upright, dragging himself backwards until he finally sat with his back to the freezing wall.

Looking down he saw his horrible blue suit was now a horrible, dirty, torn blue suit. The pink shirt was surprisingly clean though.

Just my luck, Ron coughed, spat blood and felt at his teeth. Several wobbled. Fucking pigs, he moaned.

Only then did he noticed that around one ankle was a thin cord. He followed the snaking lead along its length, to find it terminated in a house brick shaped stone which, for reasons unknown, had been painted silver. The cord had been threaded through a hole that had been drilled through the middle.

His contemplation was interrupted by loud clanging sounds from the door, which duly creaked open. A figure stepped into the cell and looked at him.

The man, if he was a man, closed the door behind him and raised a gloved finger to where his lips presumably were. Shhh, he said.

Who the fuck are you? Ron demanded, ignoring the request. And what the fuck am I doing here?

I said be quiet, the stranger said. They’ll hear us.

And I said… Ron began again, but the man raised a hand to forestall the outburst. He was dressed in a long black coat which reached down to his ankles, which was where the black boots took over. His hands were gloved, and a classic trilby hat was pulled down low over his face. Sunglasses shielded his eyes, and a mask, black of course, covered the lower half of the face, leaving no skin visible. He was medium height and appeared to be medium build, which gave precisely nothing away.

I’m here to help you. He sounded like a man, and Ron decided to go with that for the moment.

Well you can start by getting me out of here, finding me a new suit and untying me from this brick thing. He paused a moment. Why is it painted silver?

I don’t have time to do all that, the so-called-helper replied, crouching down. All I can give you are two things. He produced a business card from somewhere, like a magician at a show, and tucked it into Ron’s battered suit pocket. Go to the person on this card, they’ll help you.

What’s the other thing? asked Ron, trying to see under the hat.

The man stood back up again, looming over him ominously. For a moment he did nothing, but then he fished something out of his pocket and tossed it to Ron, who caught it awkwardly.

I’ll try and keep an eye out for you, but it’s going to be tricky, especially at first. There was a noise from the other side of the door, and with a loud click it swung open again.

When Ron looked back, the mysterious figure had vanished.

What the hell? he murmured. Must be a fucking ninja or something. Then thrust the item he’d been given in