Perfect Little Monsters and Other Stories Read online

  ***

  “I have to stay focused,” the Governor said firmly, staring across his office as Amanda slid the nose-hair trimmer into his left nostril. “I have to stay rational and -”

  He let out a gasp of pain and pulled away, before spotting a particularly long hair caught in the teeth of the trimmer with a large, glistening root.

  “Sorry,” Amanda said coolly. “Better out than in, though, right?”

  As she got back to work, the Governor took a series of deep breaths.

  “Do you know the chance of someone winning eight days in a row?” he asked finally. “It's less than 0.005%, which is... It's staggering.”

  “Sounds it,” Amanda muttered as she watched the trimmer whirring in his left nostril.

  “In weaker moments,” he continued, “I've found myself starting to wonder whether...” His voice trailed off for a moment, as if he was hesitant to give voice to some of his darker thoughts. “I've found myself seeking alternative explanations. There, I admit it. I've caught myself abandoning logic and starting to wonder if something else might be happening here, something more than mere chance.”

  “Maybe she's smarter than you realize,” Amanda suggested, as the trimmer continued to mow through the hairs in his nostril.

  “Of course she's not smart,” he replied contemptuously. “She's a criminal. Do you know why she's here? She was arrested for stealing. She claimed she was only taking food because she was hungry, but that's a ridiculous idea. No-one needs to go hungry these days. If she was that desperate, she should have just reported to one of the workhouses, she'd have been fed there in exchange for honest work. I mean, Jesus Christ, we're not living in the dark ages. The year is -”

  Suddenly he whelped and pulled back.

  A particularly thick nose-hair was caught on the trimmer, with a thick, glistening root.

  “We should do this more often,” Amanda said blankly. “I did tell you last time...”

  “Fine,” he muttered, “but enough of that side. Do the other one now.”

  She cleaned the trimmer before inserting it into his right nostril.

  “Of course,” he continued, “it's absolutely possible for someone to win eight games in a row. The odds of one victory don't actually change the odds for the following day. It's still fifty-fifty for each girl when they enter that room. I just have to focus on logic and try not to bring emotion or paranoia into the equation.” He took a deep breath, still trying to run through the possibilities in his mind. “She can't last much longer, though. Tomorrow she'll be out, I can feel it.”

  ***

  Alone in the room where he carried out his experiments, the Governor stared at one of the chairs. Pools of blood were still glistening around the wooden legs, with red smears trailing all the way to the drain. Behind the chair, blood was slowly drying on the wall, with flecks of bone and chunks of brain matter caught in the sticky mess.

  Turning, he walked over to the other chair, the chair upon which Gemma Roper sat each morning. Thanks to her run of success, this chair was now bone dry, and the blood stains on the floor and wall were much darker. Reaching down, the Governor ran a finger against the side of the chair, but there was no hint of moisture at all.

  “It's just a coincidence,” he muttered to himself. “That's all. She's just an ordinary girl, like all the other trash in this place.” He paused for a moment. “There has to be an explanation.”

  ***

  “There is absolutely nothing wrong with this gun,” Marsh said as he slid the weapon back across the desk. “Sir, I've taken it apart and examined every individual piece, and I promise you, it's in better condition than any other gun I've ever inspected. It works perfectly.”

  “I know it works,” the Governor replied, eying the gun with a hint of suspicion. “What I'm worried about is... some kind of involuntary influence that I might be introducing into the process. Is it possible that perhaps I'm holding the gun differently at certain times, and that this causes, I don't know, a heavier chamber to switch into position?”

  Marsh stared at him for a moment.

  “No, Sir,” he said finally. “That's just... No.”

  “Hear me out,” the Governor continued, warming to his theme. “What if, without realizing it, I've begun to subconsciously note the sound the gun makes when I pick it up? What if there's a slight difference, depending on whether it's going to fire or not? After all, I'm an intelligent man in good physical shape, it's certainly possible that I have certain skills and talents that I haven't noticed yet.”

  Marsh picked the gun up and examined it for a moment.

  “Sir,” he said with a sigh, “nothing like that can be happening. The way you load the gun, the way you spin the main section, the way you aim it... All of these things serve to completely randomize the game, and there is literally no way that you could -”

  “Or maybe it's the bullets,” the Governor suggested, interrupting him. “What if I'm somehow...” He paused, momentarily lost in thought as he tried to come up with another theory. “No, that wouldn't make sense,” he muttered finally, “but there has to be something I'm doing different with this Roper girl. The average player in the game lasts for a couple of rounds, yet now she's lasted for eight! You should see her eyes, too! She's starting to get confident!”

  “So what are you suggesting?” Marsh asked. “That she's somehow using the power of her mind to control the gun?”

  “Don't be ridiculous.”

  “Why not change things round a little? Why not put five bullets in the gun, instead of three? I'm pretty sure your new friend won't be able to beat those odds.”

  “I can't do that,” he replied. “I can't change the game in any way, or I'd completely invalidate all the data I've acquired so far.”

  Marsh rolled his eyes. “Sir -”

  “I just have to keep going,” the Governor continued, taking the gun and holding it up for a moment. “My faith is being tested, but I must remain strong. The numbers don't lie, and soon the girl's luck will run out. Not that it is luck, of course. This was bound to happen eventually.”

  He continued muttering to himself for a moment, almost as if he'd forgotten that Marsh was still in the room.

  “Can I go now, Sir?” Marsh asked after a couple of minutes. “I have a list of jobs to get done, and there's really nothing else I can do to prove that the gun works fine.”

  He waited, but the Governor was still talking under his breath, apparently giving himself some kind of pep talk.

  “Okay,” Marsh continued, getting up and heading to the door. “Just shut the door to my cubby-hole when you're done, yeah? I don't want some stray prisoner wandering in and messing everything up.” Stopping in the corridor and glancing back through, he waited for some kind of reply, but the Governor was still talking to himself. Realizing that there was no point trying to get through to him, Marsh pulled the door shut and left him to get on with things.

  ***

  “Don't you think you're... over-thinking this?”

  As she sat on the edge of the bath and scrubbed the Governor's back, Amanda couldn't help wondering when – if ever – her boss might emerge from his near-catatonic session of mumbling and talking to himself. He'd been at it for hours now, seemingly trying to convince himself that Gemma's run of success would end soon, and he hadn't even stirred very much when she'd suggested it was time for his daily wash. This part of the routine usually excited him, but it seemed nothing was going to distract him today.

  “She's just one girl,” Amanda continued, dipping the sponge into the warm, rose-petaled water and then gently spreading soapy bubbles across his shoulders. “And it's not like she's even doing anything, is it? She just sits there in a chair, like all the other girls, and then you pull the trigger until one of them gets their head blown off. If you think about it, there's not really much opportunity for anything to go wrong, is there?”

  Still cleaning his back, she waited for him to reply, although she wasn't particularly sur
prised when he simply continued talking to himself. She heard the word “logic” a few times, and the phrase “rational order”, and it was clear that the Governor was trying to talk himself into staying focused. Although she wanted to tell him that everything was okay, she figured the best approach was just to let him get on with things, and to wait for the following morning's round of the game.

  After all, the Roper girl was bound to die soon. Nobody's luck could hold out forever. And then the Governor would go back to his usual self.

  Day Nine

  “Just get in here!” Jacqui hissed as she and a couple of other women bundled a dazed Gemma into the bathroom. “Harriet! Go make sure no-one interrupts us!”

  “What's this about?” Gemma asked, finding herself surrounded. “I'm tired, I just want to get to breakfast and -”

  “How are you doing it?”

  Gemma frowned. “I'm not -”

  “It's a game of chance,” Jacqui continued. “Fifty-fifty, shots to the head, pow! Right? No-one can last eight days without getting their brains blown out, not unless they've got some kind of system! So come on, share it with the rest of us! How are you doing it?”

  “I'm not doing anything,” Gemma said wearily, trying to push past them. Shoved back against the wall, she sighed. “Really, I'm not. I just go in, sit down, and then he...” Her voice trailed off for a moment as she thought of all the times she'd sat in that chair and watched someone's head getting blasted apart right in front of her. “I've just had some luck so far, that's all. It'll end soon. Probably this morning.”

  “What if it's more than luck?” Shima asked. “What if you're protected?”

  Gemma turned to her. “What are you talking about?”

  “What if something or someone is... I don't know, keeping you safe?”

  “Who'd want to keep me safe?” Gemma replied. “That's a ludicrous idea.”

  “Maybe the Governor's up to something,” Karen suggested. “Maybe he's changing the game, and he's trying to test your reaction.”

  Gemma shook her head. “He's frustrated by it. Honestly, I can see it in his eyes each morning. He expects me to be the one who dies, and then somehow I make it through. Until now, anyway. It can't last much longer.”

  “Can't it?” Jacqui asked.

  “Everyone's luck runs out eventually,” Gemma pointed out. “It's inevitable. Every time I go in there and survive, I'm just delaying the moment when there's a bullet and...” She paused, shuddering at the thought. “You'll see. It'll probably happen today. I won't came back from that room, and the other person will. And then you'll see that I don't have a system, and I'm not somehow protected, and I'm just completely ordinary. There's nothing special about me.”

  The other girls paused, as if they still weren't entirely convinced.

  “Fine,” Jacqui said finally, taking a step back. “Whatever. It's not like anyone's gonna miss you once you're gone. We just figured maybe there was something you weren't telling us.”

  “There's not.”

  “Cool.” Jacqui paused, before turning to the other girls. “Come on, we're wasting our time here. She's got nothing.”

  Once the girls had filed out of the room, Gemma made her way over to the mirror and looked at her reflection. Ever since she'd first been called to take part in the game, she'd begun to look a little older each day, and now she had dark shadows under her eyes. She figured this was just the toll of witnessing so many deaths, and that she was suffering from the constant certainty that one day soon she'd be dead. At the same time, she couldn't quieten the other fears in the back of her mind, and finally she reached down and pinched her left arm, squeezing as tight as she could manage until she felt a pinprick of pain and saw a drop of blood running down to her wrist.

  At least she knew she was alive. There'd been a part of her that had wondered whether this was all in her mind, and maybe she'd actually died on the very first day.

  But no.

  She was living and breathing still.

  Exhausted, she turned and sloped back over to the doorway. She just wanted to get to breakfast, so that her name could be called and -

  Suddenly something slammed into her, pushing her against the wall.

  “One more thing, bitch,” Jacqui whispered with a grin, leaning closer. “Forget the others, they don't matter. But if you do have a secret, you'd better let me in on it before you die, okay? I'm not kidding around. If you have anything worth telling, you'd better spill it to me. And only to me.”

  “I don't have anything!” Gemma gasped. “I'm just -”

  Before she could finish, Jacqui punched her hard in the gut. Gasping as she felt a sharp pain, Gemma slumped down, only for Jacqui to slam her knee into the same spot. This time Gemma felt the crunch, and she dropped down to the ground, momentarily struggling to breathe until she managed to force some air into her lungs.

  “You're just a piece of shit,” Jacqui continued, towering over her. “No-one can keep winning the Governor's dumb little game. It's just not possible to be that lucky, so you have two options, bitch. Either get your head blown apart this morning, or start telling me how you're doing this.” She waited for an answer, but Gemma was still struggling to breathe, while wincing at the pain in her chest. “I think we understand each other,” Jacqui added, kicking her leg as she turned and walked away.

  Leaning back against the wall, Gemma gasped as she felt a sharp pain slicing through her chest. Fractured ribs were nothing, she'd been through the same thing in past. This time, though, she couldn't find the strength to get up off the bathroom floor. She knew, deep in her heart, that her luck was about to run out and she'd be dead within the next few hours.

  No-one could win the game nine days in a row.

  ***

  “Roper! Get up here!”

  She'd been waiting for the call, but still Gemma shivered as she heard the guard's voice. She stared down at her untouched breakfast tray for a moment longer, before slowly getting to her feet. Barely able to form a thought, she simply turned and shuffled toward the steps at the far end of the dining hall.

  “See you back here in thirty,” a voice whispered, nudging her arm.

  “Show 'em how it's done,” added another, patting the small of her back. The pressure caused her ribs to sing with pain again, but after an agonized and sleepless night, Gemma barely even noticed. She was just trying to ignore the rustling of support that she heard all around. It was almost as if the other prisoners were supporting her.

  “And Calhoun!” the voice shouted. “Lindsay Calhoun! You're up!”

  ***

  The gun clicked, but it was just the click of an empty chamber. Gemma didn't even flinch. She just continued to stare at the barrel, the same way she'd stared at it so many times before.

  A faint flicker of consternation crossed the Governor's face, and he kept the gun pointed at Gemma for longer than usual. For a few seconds, it almost seemed as if he was considering another try, but everyone knew he'd never break the rules of the game. He was a man who believed in the importance of rules. Still, his finger lingered on the trigger for a moment, before finally he turned and aimed at Lindsay.

  “No,” Lindsay stammered, in the opposite chair. “Please, I'll give you anything, just -”

  A shot rang out and one side of Lindsay's head was blasted away, spraying blood across the wall behind. As pieces of meat and bone slipped down to the floor, the room began to fall silent again.

  Gemma stared at the horrific sight for a moment, before looking down at her own knees. Her mind felt blank, but her body was reacting by shivering slightly.

  “Day nine,” the Governor said finally, his voice trembling with just a hint of anger as he stared at Lindsay's corpse. His lips began to move, as if he was about to say something, and then slowly he turned to Gemma again, with the gun still raised. “Day nine,” he said again, as if he couldn't quite believe what had happened and was stuck like a broken record. “Day... Day nine.”

  She stared at her
knees for a moment longer, before looking back at the dead girl opposite.

  “Look at me,” the Governor said after a moment.

  Ignoring his command, Gemma watched as blood soaked down through the front of Lindsay's uniform.

  “Look at me!” he shouted, suddenly stepping toward Gemma and grabbing her chin, forcing her to look up at his face. At the same time, he placed the barrel of the gun against her temple and kept his finger on the trigger.

  She stared into his eyes, waiting for him to make his move. Part of her was terrified, but another part was hoping he'd just get it over with.

  “There are two bullets left today,” he continued, “and two empty chambers. If I were to pull the trigger twice, Miss Roper, what would happen? Do you know?”

  She swallowed hard, which caused pain from her damaged ribs to flicker through her chest.

  “Would your luck hold out even then?” he asked, before flinching as if some unseen agony had crossed his mind. “It's not luck, though, is it? There's no such thing as luck. Only a week and feeble intellect would take refuge in the idea of luck. No, something else is guiding you to safety day after day.”

  He paused, looking down into her eyes carefully, before crouching next to her with the gun still aimed at her head. Now he was looking up into her eyes, hoping to see something different from a new angle.

  “Have you found a secret, Miss Roper?” he continued, with a trace of fascination in his voice. “Have you somehow worked out how to cheat the odds, day after day? Have you... seen something, some hidden rule, that has evaded my notice?”

  She waited, but she knew she had to answer. Slowly, she began to shake her head.

  “It's just not possible for someone to win a game of fifty-fifty nine times in a row,” he told her, “except...” He paused, and finally he looked down at the floor for a moment. “Ignore that. Of course it's possible. It's highly unlikely, but it's possible, the odds are just...” He paused again, with another flicker of anger crossing his face. He'd even begun to develop a faint squint in his left eye. “Why don't we push your so-called luck this morning? Why don't we see how far it can take you?”