The Housemates: A Novel of Extreme Terror Read online

  Alex was turning pale. “Oh, God.”

  Catherine gave her vote next. “I vote for Danni. I’m tired of having to stare at her legs all the time. I’ve never seen such short skirts.”

  I know what you mean, thought Damien.

  Danni shrugged and seemed to take the comment in her stride.

  Jade was the only one with a vote left. She used to it to seal Alex’s fate.

  “HOUSEMATES RICHARD AND ALEX WILL COMPETE IN TONIGHT’S HEAD TO HEAD ELIMINATION. PLEASE STAND BY.”

  Alex began breathing erratically, pacing back and forth.

  Richard sneered at him and laughed. “That’s it, mate. I would be shitting myself too. You ain’t got no chance against me.”

  “Shut it, Richard,” Damien warned him.

  “Else what? You’ll give me another one of your tough guy speeches. Give me a break.”

  Damien decided to take another tack. He went over to Alex and took the anxious man to one side. “Don’t listen to him, Alex. He’s just trying to get inside your head. You have as much chance of coming through this as him. Take it from a guy who has already survived two of these things. Just stay calm and focus.”

  Alex pulled his tie loose, unbuttoned his collar. “I can’t stay calm, man. I’m shitting a brick here. What the hell will they have me do?”

  “I don’t know,” said Damien. “Just keep your mind in the moment. You think ahead and you’ll just make yourself panic.”

  Alex took some deep breathes and then nodded enthusiastically. The smell of sweat wafted from his pores. “You’re right. I just got to go in there ninja-style and do what I have to do. No fear, right?”

  “Exactly. No fear.”

  “HOUSEMATES ALEX AND RICHARD, ENTER THE ELIMINATION CHAMBER.”

  “Christ, here goes,” said Alex. He took a few moments to collect himself and then clicked his fingers like a pair of guns. “Let’s do this.”

  Richard positively swaggered over to the Elimination Chamber door. It was unlikely that the guy was completely without fear, but he was doing a good job of masking it. It was more than likely just a mind game to try and unnerve Alex. In all honesty it was a smart thing to do.

  Damien sat down on the sofa in the living area and stared at the viewing screen. Everybody else took a seat around him.

  “You’ll be able to see everything from here,” said Patrick. “We’ve watched your last two tasks.”

  Damien stared at the television as it switched from displaying the grid of silhouettes to a live video feed that was coming from inside the white cube room.

  Alex and Richard were now inside. The door had closed behind them. In front of the two men was an aluminium table with a hose attached at one end. Two pipes stuck up from the centre of the table about a foot apart.

  Damien groaned. “What the hell have they got in store this time?”

  “HOUSEMATES RICHARD AND ALEX, WELCOME TO THE ELIMINATION CHAMBER. YOUR TASK IS SIMPLE…”

  Two gouts of flame ignited from the two steel pipes on the aluminium table.

  “HOLD YOUR HAND OVER THE FLAME. WHOEVER LASTS THE LONGEST WINS. THE LOSER WILL BE EVICTED.”

  The sound feed coming from inside the room was crystal clear. Damien could hear everything, could hear the other men’s fearful breathing. Richard even went so far as to voice his reluctance.

  “You bleeding psycho. Is this how you get your jollies? You better hope we don’t meet.”

  “HOUSEMATES, YOU MUST BEGIN THE TASK IN THREE SECONDS OR BOTH OF YOU WILL BE DECLARED LOSERS. 3…2…1…

  Richards and Alex both sucked in a breath and thrust their palms over the red hot flame coming from the pipes. The flaming apparatus was not dissimilar to high school Bunsen burners, but with a far more morbid purpose.

  Both men started to yell. Richard let out a manly bellow, but Alex’s screams were like that of a child.

  The resolution of the viewing screen in the living area was so high that Damien could see the smoke trails beginning to form. He could see the men’s flesh begin to blister and boil at the edges. He could only imagine the damage being done to their hands.

  Alex fell forward onto the table, but kept his hand in place. He was making animal grunting noises and stamping his feet. Richard gritted his teeth and tensed his entire body, went still like a statue. He was completely silent now and took deep, slow breaths, almost as if he were trying to meditate through the pain.

  “This is sick,” said Tracey. “I can smell them burning.”

  Damien couldn’t smell anything and wondered if the woman was exaggerating or if her horrified mind had merely created the imagined odour of singed flesh.

  Alex began to sag, his knees bending, his legs bowing. Sweat poured out of him in great gouts and his eyes began to roll back in his head.

  Then he slumped to the floor.

  Richard saw that his competitor had taken his palm away from the flame and quickly followed suit. He yanked away his own hand and backed into the nearest wall. He was snarling with pain, but also had a relieved grin on his face.

  “HOUSEMATE ALEX, YOU HAVE LOST THIS TASK. YOU ARE ELIMINATED FROM THE COMPETITION.”

  Alex tried to get to his feet but was only able to make it to his knees. He clutched his burned raw hand against his stomach while reaching at the ceiling with his other. “No, please,” he begged. “Don’t kill me. Please, just-”

  Alex’s words were cut off. His eyes bulged. Blood escaped his nose. He clutched at his wrists desperately, but after only a few seconds, he collapsed face down on the floor. He died the exact same way as Chris, poisoned by the neurotoxin.

  “CONGRATULATIONS, HOUSEMATE RICHARD. PLEASE LEAVE THE ELIMINATION CHAMBER. BANDAGES AND ANTISEPTIC HAVE BEEN PROVIDED IN THE PANTRY. PLEASE TEND TO YOUR WOUNDS.

  3

  The customary video, intended to condemn Alex, appeared onscreen. Everybody sat quietly on the sofa while it played. It began with the word ‘COWARD’ being displayed on screen.

  A CCTV feed began. It was in black and white and seemed to have been recorded at night. The scene showed an empty road, a zebra crossing in the foreground.

  A stranger appeared on the screen. It was a young woman. She was dressed as though she’d been on a night out, high heels and glitzy dress. She was about halfway across the zebra crossing when a long silver Mazda hit her. Fortunately the car had only been travelling at about 20mph, but that just made it even more bizarre that the driver hadn’t managed to stop in time.

  Then it became clear. The CCTV images showed a clearly inebriated man falling out of the Mazda. The man was undoubtedly Alex if the platinum blond hair was anything to go by. He was wearing a crumpled suit and had party streamers hanging from his neck. He’d obviously been at some sort of do; perhaps some opulent function arranged by the bank.

  Alex stared down at the woman on the ground and shook his head in obvious horror. The victim was badly injured, but still conscious. She reached out to Alex weakly.

  He continued staring down at her for a moment longer.

  Then he got back in his car and drove away.

  The CCTV video feed ended and a young woman in a wheelchair appeared on screen. A huge divot of missing flesh scarred the left side of her face. She was smiling, but the expression was ugly. When she spoke she sounded manic. “I was pregnant, you bastard. But I found you. Ha! I found you, you bastard. I know who you are, Alex Strickland. Now you’re going to pay.”

  The video ended. A picture of Alex’s dead face appeared amongst the silhouettes.

  Another one down.

  4

  The mood was sombre. Night had fallen over the house like a clinging blanket. The garden outside was nothing but a black square through the window. The remaining housemates were sharing a couple of bottles of wine, but no one was hitting the alcohol as hard as before. Nobody had even spoken in the last hour or so. Even Richard was contemplative as he picked at the bandages he had taken from the pantry and applied to his severely burned hand. Nobody had offered
to help him.

  “We’re so screwed,” said Jules. “Alex was a big time banker. The people doing this to us don’t care about the consequences. We’re just going to disappear off the face of the earth as far as the outside world is concerned.”

  “Does anybody even know where we are?” Patrick asked. His skinny neck looked odd inside the large metal collar.

  “We’re in the middle of nowhere,” Damien answered. “I looked under my hood when we were on the bus. I think we’re pretty far north, in the Highlands or something.”

  Patrick raised an eyebrow at him. “You managed to take a look? Did you see anything at all?”

  “Just hills and mud. Like I said, the middle of nowhere.”

  Everybody seemed to deflate.

  “So even if we get away, there’s nowhere to run,” said Jade.

  Damien shrugged. “Who knows? I doubt they plan on letting any of us get back to civilisation. They can’t have us exposing what’s going on here.”

  “What about the winners, though?” Jules asked. “They said we can still win the money. Surely they will let the winners go.”

  “I doubt it.”

  “It’s still the only chance we have,” said Patrick. “I’m still intending to win if I can. I don’t want to see anybody else hurt, but I’m going to do what I have to; anything that means me staying alive.”

  “That’s fine,” said Damien. “Long as you can live with the rest of us being dead, more power to you.”

  “What choice do I have?” said Patrick. “We’re all in the same boat here.”

  Everybody went back to being silent. There was no way around the fact that they could only live by witnessing the death of the others. It seemed like nobody wanted to converse for fear of getting to know each other. It would only make the days ahead harder.

  More difficult to watch a friend die than a stranger.

  Damien could sense any willingness for teamwork drain away as individual preservation became the new priority. It was no longer about avoiding the vote; it was about surviving inside the elimination chamber once your number was up.

  “We should try to escape,” said Tracey. “I would rather die fighting than let someone order me around like a play toy.”

  Jade shook her head. “If we start trying to get out they’ll just switch our bracelets on. They could kill us in seconds.”

  “If we all try to escape,” said Patrick, “we will end up dead. At least if we play the game two of us might live. Or maybe even just one, but that’s better than none.”

  Damien kept thinking about the notion of escaping. It was a pretty pointless pursuit, but something kept tickling at the edges of his mind, a thought trying to find its way to his brain.

  He stood up from the sofa and went over to the kitchen. While he was still trying to grasp the thing that was niggling at him, he looked around at the cupboards and appliance. He wasn’t quite sure what he was looking for but his gaze settled on some old egg shells and a carton of milk. An empty bottle of wine lay on its side on one of the counters.

  That was when it occurred to him.

  The alcohol. They’ve been restocking the pantry. They even left bandages and anti-septic in there for Richard earlier.

  As Damien thought about the housemate’s recent movements, he became certain that nobody from the outside had entered the house, which meant that the only way they could restock the pantry was if they did so from outside.

  There must be a door at the back of the pantry. There has to be for them to keep filling up the room with alcohol and supplies.

  Damien turned his gaze slowly to the pantry door. He wondered if he was being watched right now, recorded by the unseen cameras that must have adorned the many corners of the house.

  Slowly, he inched towards the pantry, letting out a soft whistle to try and act like he was just killing time and going through his thoughts. He started to think about his next move. Even if he found a secret doorway, it would likely be locked. Even if it wasn’t, he was still at a massive disadvantage due to the toxic bracelets clamped around his wrists.

  Still, like Catherine said, I think I would rather go down fighting. If I can take a few lumps out of my captors then all the better.

  Damien positioned himself in front of the pantry door and placed his fingers around the handle. He pushed down and pulled the door open carefully.

  “What are you doing?” Danni called over to him.

  Damien flinched and spun around. He realised that his heart was beating fast. He had to talk slowly in order to remain calm. He gave Danni a smile. “Just looking for some snacks,” he said.

  “We’ve put them all in the cupboards. What do you fancy?”

  “I erm…was just looking if there was anything else. They might have restocked us.”

  “I checked a little while ago,” said Jade. “But you can grab us another bottle of wine if you’d like.”

  Damien nodded. “Will do.” He turned back to the pantry. The door had closed when he span around, so he opened it again and looked inside. Other than a few crates of beer and several bottles of wine and some liquor, there was nothing inside except for empty space. He examined the cramped area, searching for a doorway or hatch. All he found was smooth walls on all sides.

  His head dropped. He let out a sigh.

  How the hell are they getting into the pantry if not through a door or hatchway?

  As Damien’s gaze fell to the floor, he spotted something. The bottom of the pantry was carpeted. The raggedy beige pile went from the doorway up to the back of the closet-like space. On the left and right of the floor the carpet curled up against the skirting board, but at the back of the closet it did not – it was flat. The reason it remained flat was because it went right under the wall and continued to a space beyond. The wall at the back of the pantry was not a solid structure. It had been placed down on top of the carpet.

  It’s a partition. Maybe they just slide it away or pull it back from the other side.

  Carefully, hoping that the cameras were not picking up the inside of the small room, Damien rapped his knuckles against the partition wall. It rattled and vibrated. It was not secure.

  Without thinking about the consequences, Damien rocked back and kicked out as hard as he could. The partition skidded backwards along the carpet and then fell flat with a whomph of air escaping from underneath.

  Damien wandered into the secret room and had no time to react as the man in black overalls struck him in the face. He tumbled into the wall and tripped over the tangle of his own legs. He slid down to the floor, looking up to see that he was in some kind of storage room. There was a heavy, steel door at the far end.

  The man in black overalls hopped forward and booted Damien in the chin. “The game isn’t over yet, son! So you’re going to get your ass back in that house and play along.”

  Damien spat blood and scowled up at the man. “Fuck you! I’m done being your bitch. You want to kill me, do it now. Tell whoever arranged this to go suck off a tramp because that’s all they’re good for!”

  The man in black overalls took a run up and swung another kick at Damien’s face. Damien managed to tumble aside and avoid the blow. With the other man off balance, he scrambled up to his feet and got himself some space to fight back.

  He put his dukes up and spat some more blood onto the carpet. “Come on then, fuckface. Let’s see how hard you really are.”

  The man in black overalls glared at Damien and then came right at him.

  Damien fought dirty. He faked a wide hook with his right, but jabbed out with his left and struck the man in the throat, who immediately stumbled backwards, choking and spluttering.

  Damien lashed out again and kicked the man’s legs from under him, sending him crashing onto his back, now winded as well as choking. Damien stood over him, reading to put the man down for good. “You ain’t shit, son,” he said, raising his foot ready to stamp.

  Pain shot through Damien’s wrists. He staggered sideways and then
fell to his knees. There was fire in his veins. The bracelets had activated. His body was being flooded with the toxin. He clawed at them, ripping off a layer of skin.

  This is it! They’re going to kill me.

  Least I got a few digs in.

  The man in black overalls hacked and coughed, caught his breath. He climbed back to his feet and grabbed a hold of Damien’s collar. He began dragging him along the floor like a bag of sand.

  Upside down, Damien’s head fell back and he saw the other housemates standing in the entryway he’d created when he’d kicked down the partition wall.

  “Get back inside the house now!” The man in black overalls shouted at them all. “Or you will all be dead in less than one minute.”

  To Damien’s disappointment, the other housemates all complied. They scampered back inside and allowed the man in black overalls to drag him through the pantry and into the kitchen.

  “Why are you doing this?” Danni whimpered.

  “Shut up. Everybody go and sit on the sofa.”

  Damien moaned as he was harshly dumped on the tiled floor of the kitchen. The man in black overalls stared down at him and shook his head. “You just made a big fucking mistake.”

  The man in black overalls left.

  Damien lay on his side and moaned. Danni leapt up from the sofa and came running over to him. She knelt down beside him. “Are you okay? Did they poison you?”

  “Y…yeah, but I think I’m okay. The pain is going away. They must have activated the collar.”

  Jules had come over, too, and was staring at Damien with worried eyes. “What did you do? What just happened?”

  He sat up and caught his breath. “I found a secret compartment. I didn’t think about it, just tried to get through.”

  “But didn’t you think that they would just use the bracelets to control you?”

  “Of course I did, but I didn’t care. I wanted to do something to fight back.”

  “I’m sorry we didn’t do the same,” said Catherine. “Perhaps that was our only chance.”

  “What could we have done?” Patrick asked. “Nothing, that’s what.”