ASBO-Boy - Unleash the Hounds: Part 3

Saturday November 5th 2016

For the second time that night Squeeze woke up to the feeling of Bark hitting him across the face.

“Get up – or you’ll choke on your own blood.” Bark rolled over, nudging Squeeze with his shoulders. The pain seemed to be coming from his nose, closer inspection revealed it was broken and bleeding profusely.

“Where are we?”

“Shhh!” Bark spat. There were voices coming from the next room. The two of them were unceremoniously sprawled across a cold stone floor in a dark room. Above them light seemed to be emanating from a small ventilation shaft. They were underground, somewhere.

“ – of course they’ll be looking for them. That’s why we give them back in body bags.”

“Come off it – like that’s a good idea. If they think we’re stupid enough to kill people they’ll put more than a token into flushing us out. We’re safe for the time being because they think we’re harmless.”

“Sian is right. We can’t think about killing people. Even if they are Hounds. While they’re in our hands though, we have some power.”

“Only until they wake up. We all know that place turns these kids into sycophantic zombies.”

There was a crackle of light from the next room. “I got out, didn’t I?” It was the girl with the talent for pyrotechnics.

“Can we trust them?”

“Possibly. Depends on how long they were under.”

Squeeze shook his head and cleared the stars that were swimming in front of his eyes. He looked over at Bark. With a nod they were both decided. They did their party tricks and soon both of them were on their feet, the ropes from their hands and feet in piles at their feet.

“What was that?”

Bark didn’t hang around – he drew himself up to his full height and quickly doubled in size. With a below he charged forward and ploughed through the door and into the next room. Squeeze, without time to think, dove in after him.

Paper and wood was thrown into the air with a mighty crash as Bark launched the table in the centre of the room up into the air. People were sprawled across the floor, diving out of Bark's way. “Find a way out!” He bellowed to Squeeze, who dodged several attempts to grab him. Briefly he glimpsed a door on the far side of the room and made for it, leaping over heads and limbs.

There was a flash and the room seemed to seethe with energy. Squeeze felt himself being thrown to the floor. Standing above him was the girl from the helicopter, only now she looked like a woman, forty feet tall and rippling with power.

“Enough!” She cried, lowering herself to the floor.

Bark and Squeeze scrambled to the centre of the room while the others crowded in around them. “Leave them!” She shouted.

“Let us go.” Bark spat without much conviction.

Squeeze took a look at the angry, bewildered faces around him. Most were older, from all over the Wards. There were only a few who were around their age.

“Alex!” One of them cried, clambering forward to hug Bark around the neck. Squeeze watched him diminish and wither back to normal. Brother? Father, possibly?

"Kill them!" Someone shouted.

"No. Look at them. They're no danger to us." The girl from the helicopter stepped forward as did the other younger members. Squeeze watched them display their true colours. They were all Others. One had a blue face; another seemed to flicker, like a bad TV signal; another seemed to be covered moss. "My name's Arc-Light." She offered her hand and Squeeze stood up, unsteadily, "Sorry for zapping you."

Squeeze smiled sheepishly. Bark stood up with his relative's help. They were both grinning madly. "This my baby brother Alex." Squeeze scanned the room for people he recognised, but there were none.

"Who are you people?" Bark managed to gasp, clinging desperately to his brother.

Arc-Light stood aside and gestured to someone sitting in the corner of the room, a woman in her mid-twenties. She was smartly dressed and pretty, but there was a haunted quality to her. She stood up and looked down at them severely.

"The Evening Post calls us the Underground. But that's giving us more organisational credit than we deserve. We're a support group really for the families and victims of the phenomenon known as Otherness." She looked around at the tired, lined faces around her. "My name's Gwen. Nice to meet you."