Page 78 of Drift

A blast of trumpet cut through the bedroom from the surround sound hooked up to most of the manor. Usually it was voice activated, but anyone near a streaming device could target it to specific rooms, both here and in the summerhouse. This seemed to rebound everywhere.

“Ah.” Light twisted around, then the bass hit the walls and another pounded into his ribcage and head. The hits came hard and fast on his senses after that with each heavy pulse—coloured particles exploding out from around the bed… the bedside table… the walls with each blare of trumpet and bass, all a mass of erratic multi-coloured heartbeats that rebounded off each other in shockwaves, all to hit Light on a continuous ricochet that blinded.

Echoes of a rave he never wanted to taste again hit the back of his throat, the taste of smoke flares and a mix of CS Gas… the sound of bracken under foot close by as people ran and screamed… and Brin—

Light… You in any trouble?

What the… what the actual… fuck? This was why Light didn’t like loud music around him anymore… not the sort found at a rave that got the cells in his body dancing with a life and mind of their own. Head… it pushed his head back into dark web games and coloured I-dosing landscapes he no longer wanted to walk. Subtle colours and chemicals, those he could tolerate, but this?

“Hey…”A tug at his arm tried to snap him back. “You okay?” Simon had to shout over the music.

Another beat hit, and all the colours around Simon exploded outwards, all of Simon’sdistresscalledout in a constantly shifting heartbeat that mingled with the tones of his voice.

“JesusfuckingChrist.” Light covered his ears and briefly screwed his eyes shut to try and chase it all away. Simon struggled in his own way and seemed stuck on permanent wince as he tried to cope with the assault too. But he wasn’t as stupid as Light. He didn’t risk covering his ears and blocking out all noise.

But the reactions weren’t just Light’s. For one terrifying moment, he thought it had been. Ghosts he could handle and still wanted to talk to, but never under the influence of an I-dosing landscape.

But the music hitting the halls?

Light knew the song, and it was so left field and out of context for anyone walking here it set his heart pounding.

A call out to see all the… “Freaks” by Timmy Trumpet & Savage.

Wrong. Light had been made to feel wrong in these walls too many times, and this…. This was hard play from the third kid who’d gotten inside. A calling card to get all the freaks on the dancefloor.

The Pied Piper calling out the rats….

The irony there of that being Martin’s nickname for him burned deep, and Light moved before Simon.

Chapter 24

PIED PIPER

As Gray and Ray joined them, Light made it through to the west wing hall doors. He’d already checked in here, but that had been twenty minutes ago, and anyone could have walked in since, which from the checks on the CCTV and source of the loud music, someone did play arsehole inside.

Security protocol had been set for this side of the manor as well as in the hall, but with the music bleeding his head and ears, he bypassed them all, and despite a warning snarl off someone—Simon?—he pushed on through.

Light’s smack at the light switch took away the darkness inside, then his shift for the stereo took out the music. But the pressure in his head didn’t ease as he moved so fast for the middle of the floor, needing to take down whoever had been stupid enough to press every single one of his freak buttons.

“Hey, fuck. Whoa.” Someone sidestepped his knock meant for their calf to send them sprawling, but Light shifted back around in the same breath, his backhand smacking jaw despite the street rat trying to pull out of the way a second time. “Shit.” A grunt, a twist out of the way of Light’s roundhouse kick, then… nothing. The kid who had spoken was gone.

Light twisted around, not understanding why he was left fighting an empty wooden floor. “What the?”

Back by the door, a sharp whistle came off Simon, a nod off to the left, and Light looked back over by the wall.

A thin decorated ledge ran the perimeter of the whole hall, roughly about eight feet off the floor, just a few inches wide.

Crouched on top of a small section, the street rat winked his way from underneath such a long fringe.

“You okay there, Slappy Chan?” A slight cock of a smile. “Need another minute on your own to get it out of your system?”

Korean.

The report had said Korean. Korean heritage, and… and….

Jesus.

Jude wore simple black compression sports shirt and pants, the fit slipstream-tight to his body, like all he was missing was his racing bike for the hard-and-fast workout on the streets. The choice looked innocent: allowing the snug material to cool the body in the summer yet offer to keep it warm in the winter. But no reflective stripes licked lovingly at the material to his pants, even with being out in the dark, neither offering nor asking for safe zones. It took that offer of innocence into dark waters with just how well he’d blended into the night until Light had flicked the switch in the hall. It didn’t help with how the whole black fingerless gloves, a skull scarf handing out of the lip of his compression pants, and canvas shoes with a good grip finished off the inconspicuousout not to be seenlook. Even jet-black hair was shaved at the back and sides, with a long fringe at the front, almost to hide his eyes and pale skin. Yet two pure white streaks in his fringe touched his lips and offered a striking contrast to the jet blackness of his hair, along with the single white dagger earing in his left ear, and…

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