The Game Trilogy (14 page)

When he was on his fifth bowlful the front door was wrenched open with a crash and a moment later a cloud of foam and white smoke overwhelmed him even before he could put his hands over his face.

Coughing madly, he staggered back towards the kitchen and blinked away the tears enough to get a window open before collapsing on the floor. He was gasping desperately for breath, but his throat had shrunk to the size of a drinking-straw.

Everything was starting to go black.

From down in the street there was the sound of sirens and people shouting orders.

‘Dialling one-one-two is easy to do,’ the child’s voice inside his head chanted just before he lost consciousness.

‘You were lucky, Henrik,’ the doctor said, unaware that she was echoing what her colleague in St Göran had said the night before.

‘You inhaled a bit of smoke, and you have a minor burn on your left hand, but that’s more or less it.’

He nodded mutely from the trolley. It was considerably easier to breathe now, presumably thanks to the oxygen mask.

‘We’re going to rinse your eyes once more, you got covered in a fair bit of foam, but there’s no real danger. Your vision might be a bit fuzzy for a couple of days, but it’ll pass.’

He nodded again.

There was no point trying to talk with the mask on, and besides, what would he say?

‘Well, then,’ the doctor said as she got up. ‘If you haven’t got any questions, I need to get going. Even if you feel fine, keep the mask on until the nurse has rinsed your eyes. You need to breathe pure oxygen to drive out the carbon monoxide you’ve inhaled. Look after yourself, Henrik!’

He nodded a third time, in both confirmation and farewell.

Then he was finally alone.

The tumble-dryer got going again, this time on an advanced setting. But before he had time to concentrate on it there was a knock on the door and two uniformed police officers stepped in. Perfect, just what he needed.

King of the Mounties, Cling and Clang are here to ruin your day. Shit!

They turned out to be called Paulsson and Wöhl, and once he’d asked to see their badges and carefully examined them, even though they were in full uniform, they had a few questions for him.

Did he happen to have any enemies? No, officer, he didn’t.

Could he think of any other reason why someone would want to pour paraffin through his letterbox and set fire to his hall?

Yes, he could certainly think of a reason, but he had no intention of sharing it with a couple of flat-footed cops, or anyone else come to that. He didn’t need any more reminders of the rules, thanks very fucking much!

‘No, officer, I’m afraid not,’ he replied instead with his head tilted to one side and his honest look on his face. Neither of them seemed to buy it, but what the hell!

Apart from what he had told them about the outbreak of the fire, was there anything else he could tell them that could be relevant to their investigation?

Same answer again, for the third time: No, not a thing!

The cops exchanged a knowing glance over their notepads, and after a few final pearls of wisdom they finally gave up.

‘The case will be investigated by the Södermalm Police.’ Great, thanks very much!

He already knew what the result would be. Absolutely zilch.

‘Hi, it’s me … Micke …’ he added, in case she didn’t recognize his voice.

‘Hi,’ she said curtly, then realized that she was actually pleased he had called.

‘How are you?’

He sounded a bit unsure, as if he didn’t really know what to say. It was usually her who phoned.

‘Fine, thanks, just a bit tired. Work’s been a bit busy,’ she found herself saying, surprised at her honesty.

‘Oh, I see … You probably don’t really feel like meeting up, then?’

She was silent for a couple of seconds. Her headache hadn’t given up, her ribs were still sore, and Henke’s final words were still echoing in her head. So no, not really!

‘Sure, I can be round in half an hour,’ she replied, and for the second time in the conversation she surprised herself.

‘I thought maybe we could go out … have a bit of a chat?’ he went on quickly.

Her brain said it was time to pull the hand-brake.

Fucking, yes, talking, no! We don’t have time for that sort of thing, Normén!

‘Sure!’ her mouth replied disobediently, and forty-five minutes later they were sitting in a little Thai place up in Vasastan, and to her surprise she discovered that it was really, really nice just having a bit of a chat for a while.

Okay, so what the hell was he going to do now?

No job, no money, he’d had a row with his sister, his flat was uninhabitable and, maybe worst of all, he’d been chucked out of the Game!

The Goat had let him crash on his sofa for a couple of days, but all the coming and going and all the fucking dopehead dweebs who seemed to hang around in the flat all the time were driving him mad. Didn’t the bastards have jobs to go to?

He needed time to think, to go through his options and plan his next moves. Not that he had many lined up, exactly …

As usual, Manga was the one who stepped up. His old woman wasn’t exactly happy, but evidently their religion meant they had to be hospitable and generous to the poor, so she didn’t have much choice. But that didn’t mean that Betul missed any opportunity to scowl at him, no, she didn’t exactly hold back there. But HP ignored her from his comfortable lying position on their best Ikea sofa.

HP/Islam 1, miserable witch 0.

Something to be pleased about, anyway. That and the
fact that he now had plenty of time to think. Betul didn’t like computers, which was pretty absurd when you considered what her husband did for a living. But seeing as she was head of the Al-Hassan family, there was no Playstation, no PC, nor any film channels to disturb his concentration, leaving HP with time to think at last.

A job could wait, he still had a few days left on unemployment benefit and something was bound to turn up. The flat would be fixed in a week or so. New paint, new floor and a new front door, all paid for by the insurance. Bloody lucky that Becca had kept up with the most important bills when he was short of cash.

So how could he make it up to her?

Sadly there was no good answer to that question.

Becca was furious with him, and for good reason. He’d crossed the line the other day, seriously marched over it. But he hadn’t actually had any choice. She mustn’t get caught up in this, at least not any more than she already was.

But it already looked like it was too late. They must have been watching him somehow. And saw her visiting him and thought he was spilling the beans again. Somewhere a mobile phone had flashed and a player, maybe even some fucking rookie, had been given the task of teaching the grass a lesson, the same way he had done with the door over in Birkastan.

A little home delivery, à la Game Master.

According to the cops, his wasn’t the first call to the emergency services. Someone had rung a few minutes earlier, probably around the time that they started the fire, so they presumably didn’t want to kill him. Not this time, anyway.

Which led him back to his original question. What was he going to do now? Did they really expect him just to forget everything, keep his mouth shut and never
think about the Game again? Could he do that even if he wanted to?

Apart from the business with the stone and his sister, he had been run over, beaten up, given the third degree, had the shit scared out of him and then his flat set fire to.

So in other words, he had plenty of reasons to be pissed off.

But the sickest thing in this whole mess was that in spite of everything they’d done to him, he was still dreaming about getting back in, being forgiven and allowed to carry on playing.

Step back out onto the track to the applause of the spectators.

He could see it was wrong, that it was completely insane, in fact, but he still couldn’t shake the thought.

What if he could get in touch with someone, the Game Master himself perhaps? Say he was sorry and maybe get another chance? The question was just how to go about it? There was no contact list, sadly, and he had a fair idea that he wouldn’t have any luck with the Yellow Pages or Google.

Okay, he still had the mobile phone, but that had been dead since the fire. The battery must be exhausted by now. But all those hours on the sofa had at least given him one idea. Every modern mobile was a sort of little computer. They had at least two different types of memory where it ought to be possible to dig out something useful, if you only knew what you were doing.

Luckily he had the right man for the job. Straight out of
One Thousand and One Nights:
his own reluctant host, the world’s most browbeaten husband, the artist formerly known as … Manga!

‘I know you’re keen to have a look at this, Mangalito,’ he said an hour or so later, tossing the mobile on the shop counter. ‘It’s all yours. All I need to know is who’s been
sending me messages and how I can turn the tables and contact them.’

Manga looked at him lazily over a copy of that day’s
Metro
without moving a finger, but he couldn’t fool HP. HP could see the corner of one of his friend’s eyes literally start to twitch. And, just like when they were playing poker, all you had to do was sit it out.

Easy peasy!

‘On one condition,’ Manga said after a few seconds of trying to look uninterested.

‘Whatever …!’

As long as it doesn’t break rule number one, HP thought to himself.

Manga grinned.

‘That from now on you call me Farook!’

‘Deal!’ HP said in relief, before he realized what he’d agreed to.

Oh well, if it would make the towel-head happy …

It had been a nice meal. Very good food, and a decent atmosphere. Thai, but without being kitsch the way Asian restaurants often were. There had been no trace of ‘Love Me Tender’ in Thai, or concertina lanterns with selected words of Buddhist wisdom. No, it had all been really good, in fact.

They’d done just the right amount of talking, had kept quiet while they were eating, and he hadn’t even raised an eyebrow when she declined the wine, just as he hadn’t questioned her explanation of a minor traffic accident to cover her injuries. Afterwards they’d exchanged a quick kiss, then they had each gone back home on their own.

She realized that it was the first time that had happened.

So what did that mean? Were they on their way to a proper relationship?

Absolutely not, she decided, firmly interrupting that line of thinking.

They had simply had a nice meal, talked about all manner of things, nothing of any great significance. He had talked about his parents’ farm in Södermanland, and how he had moved to the city to study instead of taking over the farm, and how he had been trying to stay out of the way as best he could.

‘Guilty conscience,’ he had said with a wry smile. Not being able to live up to expectations.

She understood perfectly what he meant. She had listened with interest and occasionally made a comment, though without volunteering the same level of confidence herself. But he had worked that out fairly quickly and hadn’t pushed her in that direction at all.

He was actually a nice guy. Better than she deserved.

‘I’ll call you later in the week,’ he had said, and she hadn’t protested.

She realized that she was looking forward to him calling, in fact.

‘Like some story in a bloody women’s magazine,’ she snorted.

She wondered how Henke was getting on?

But, then again, why should she care?

HP was impressed. After a bit of fiddling about, Manga – no, Farook – had managed to open a compartment on the phone that HP had never even noticed, and had plugged a USB cable into the little socket hidden inside. Obviously he should have known that there had to be a way into it, but he’d been so absorbed by what was happening on the screen that he hadn’t given any thought to the basics, such as how you charged the thing when the battery was exhausted.

As soon as Manga plugged the cable into one of the computers at the back of the shop a little charging light went on, so evidently it would work with any USB power-source.

A bit of nifty typing, then a load of symbols started rolling on one of the computer screens.

HP was by no means a novice when it came to computers, but this was out of his league, no question. Manga was a wiz at computers and maybe he’d be able to find out something useful.

‘This is going to take a while,’ he muttered, and HP agreed without protest to run a few errands in the city. In a fit of generosity, he even brought paper cups of latte back to the shop so they wouldn’t have to drink the bitter brewed coffee from the hotplate.

But when he got back something had changed. Manga seemed to have been practically waiting for him just inside the door. He grabbed HP’s arm and dragged him into the shop, almost spilling the lattes.

‘What the fuck are you doing, calm down!’

But Manga wasn’t listening. Instead he shut the door, locked it and changed the sign to ‘Closed’.

Without a word he pulled HP over to the corner where the computer was.

The three screens were showing a series of film-clips.

HP unscrewing the wheel nuts of a Ferrari.

HP blowing up the Horse-Guards in Kungsträdgården.

HP dropping a stone over a railing at Lindhagensplan and then a car with flashing blue lights rolling over and over until it came to rest with smoke rising from the engine …

His stomach clenched tight.

‘What the fuck are you really up to?’ Manga hissed, giving him an accusing stare.

So much for rule number one, then …

His third transgression in twenty-four hours, this was seriously not good.

Fucking mega not good!

‘Can that thing hear us?’ he said anxiously, pointing at the mobile.

‘What? No, of course it can’t!’ Manga snarled. ‘What the fuck is this about, HP?’

HP gave the phone another quick glance and, just to be sure, pulled Manga with him into the little cubbyhole behind the counter. He licked his lips nervously while he tried to gather his thoughts.

Purely technically, he had only broken the rules once. He hadn’t actually blabbed to his sister, even if the Game seemed to think he had and had punished him accordingly. So really he’d been punished for something he hadn’t done, which meant they owed him one. Besides, he needed Manga, sorry, Farook. Without him he wouldn’t be able to contact the Game.

So you could say that everyone gained from the violation of the rules that he was contemplating. He hadn’t expected Manga to be able to get any pictures out of it. An IP-address, maybe a server host somewhere, that was all he needed to get going. But when it came to technology his old friend was far too smart for his own good. So how could he get Manga to go along with his plan?

‘Okay, it’s like this … Farook,’ he said, tasting the unfamiliar name cautiously.

He had to play this on Manga’s terms …

‘Like I told you, I found the mobile on the train from Märsta the other week, but what I didn’t tell you is that it invited me to play a game. A rather special game, actually …’

In retrospect she realized that she already knew it was going to be there. She’d had an uneasy feeling ever since she entered the changing room and when she opened her locker she realized why.

It should have been you!

Another official white post-it note with red writing, neatly stuck to the edge of the shelf, just like the one before.

And just like the last one, she realized the note was right. It should have been her. It would have been fairer somehow if it was her body instead of Kruse’s that got smashed up in the car. An eye for an eye, you could almost say. Then she would have been able to move on at last. Put it all behind her. Maybe, anyway.

But it couldn’t go on like this.

First there were the notes, which were appearing more and more often, then Henke going crazy, and then Micke, who had suddenly broken their usual pattern without warning. She had to get a grip on things, regain control over her own life. She couldn’t put it off any longer, she had to do it now. And she had to start with Nilla.

HP had actually stuck to the truth. Almost, anyway. The only thing he left out was the small fact that his sister had been in the cop-car that he hit over at Lindhagens. But otherwise it had pretty much been nothing but the truth … Possibly with one or two minor exceptions. Manga would never buy the fact that he wanted to carry on playing. Which wasn’t so strange. He could hardly believe it himself, that he was even considering anything like that. And Manga was no longer the gambling type. Apart from the occasional World of Warcraft session, where he kept on going with his tired old Paladin character, nowadays
he played it safe. Wife and child, flat in the suburbs and all that.

He’d forgotten the kick you got from gaming, the rush from the adrenalin coursing through your body, and, even more important: Manga had no idea what it was like to feel chosen, appreciated, and to get loads of cred from an entire fucking world!

So he ended up covering his motives with a little white lie …

He said he wanted to find out who was behind the Game, maybe give an anonymous tip-off to one of the evening papers, or
Crimewatch
or something like that? A bit of payback for all the shit he’d had to take. Manga bought it without question, and why not? It could very easily have been true.

He was able to dig out a server address more or less instantly, but after that things ground to a complete halt. HP got a bit down-hearted but Manga wasn’t the sort to give up just like that. From what they could work out, the server appeared to be in Sweden, and if it was, then that meant that somewhere in cyberspace there was someone who had sold, installed and configured it. The odds that such a person would be somewhere in Manga’s network of contacts were pretty good.

He’d put out a few tentative feelers and they’d have to wait to see if there was any response. That wasn’t quite the scenario HP had been hoping for. Patience and waiting were definitely not his bag, but on the other hand he didn’t really have much choice.

He’d just have to grin and bear it.

A GroupWise message was really all it took to get going. She soon found Nilla’s email address on the internal contact list, even though she had a different surname, but
it had been thirteen years and she had almost counted on Nilla being married by now.

So what was the best way to put it?

It took Rebecca over an hour to compose the email, and in the end she realized that if she was ever going to send it, she would have to keep it short.