Subject 375. Nikki Owen

You fucking what?’

      She leans forward, then suddenly—before I can move, think, assess—she knocks me to the floor. My notebook flies from my pants and slides out of reach. Panic. Fear. A rocket of blood pressure. My hands reach for the notepad, but Michaela jumps on me with her whole torso. Foul body odour. Clammy skin. Suffocating me. She pins me down, flies fists into my face, raining them down on me like giant hailstones. I try to move my head, tossing it from side to side, try to lift my left arm, legs, feet, hands, but she has me locked, chained by her limbs. Desperate, I feel for my notebook and, to my fleeting relief, manage to grab it as another fist hurtles towards me, but this time, somehow, I roll to the side, knee her hard in the groin. She screams. I scramble, clawing my way across the floor, but then she seizes me again, flings me to the wall like her battered prey. The notebook spins away and out of sight.

      Michaela stops, her shoulders heaving, chest lurching. Thinking she will hit me again, I crouch, gulp in air. Blood trickles down my forehead.

      ‘You should watch your mouth,’ she says, her breathing hard, heavy.

      My ribs throb. I wince. Two, maybe three, are broken.

      ‘You gone fucking mute? Say something.’

      Boots. The sound of guards’ boots on the walkway.

      Michaela looks to the door then takes one step forward. Then another.

      I raise my hands over my head, fingers trembling.

      ‘You need to stay where you are, Martinez,’ Michaela says, her voice barely audible. But even in my frightened state, even though I fear she will kill me, I hear it, there, something different about her voice. Her accent. It is Scottish; no longer East London. Scottish.

      ‘You have to stay in here,’ she says. ‘Stay in Goldmouth. It is vital, understand? We know who you are. You need to stay put. Or Callidus will come knocking. Forget Father Reznik, you hear? Forget he was ever there. You shouldn’t have come looking in the first place. Either of you.’

      I spit out some blood. ‘What is Callidus?’ I say through ragged breaths.

      She bends down so her face is almost touching mine. ‘Callidus is something that doesn’t exist.’

      ‘How do you know about Father Reznik?’ But she does not reply. ‘How?’ I yell. ‘What do you mean, “either of us”?’

      Inhaling, Michaela steps back and raises her fists. ‘Fucking cunt!’ she yells with one eye on the door. I go rigid. Her accent. The tone of how she now speaks…Her London voice is back. Raw terror explodes inside me, ripping into me, tearing me to pieces. This woman knows we were looking for him, me and the priest. She knows. Yet how? Who is she? I need help. Now, I need…

      But Michaela lets out a wild scream, one ear-piercing howl. And before I can respond, before an unfamiliar instinct to launch myself at her can kick in, she punches me clean in the head.

      Then: nothing.

      ‘And did you believe her, this Michaela?’ Kurt says.

      Two hours have gone. Lost. How did that happen? I look from the clock to Kurt and realise that I haven’t answered him yet. ‘Yes, I believed her. Why would I not?’

      Kurt crosses his legs. ‘You said Michaela mentioned something called Callidus, correct?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘And I assume you know what it means?’

      I scarcely move. My fingers begin to tap furiously on my knee, the phrase, who is he, whipping round my head like a tornado, a lethal storm. Can he be aware of what it really is? What it really stands for? ‘What do you know?’ I finally say, and I am surprised at the venom in my voice, the clench of my jaw.

      His eyes are narrowed, pen pointed. ‘Maria, I purely refer to the word, “callidus”. That is all. I simply want to hear if you know its definition.’

      I let my shoulders drop. What am I thinking? He only wants a definition. A definition. Do I want him to believe me unhinged? Crazy? Because if I continue to overanalyse every single word he utters, continue to try to decipher every utterance, every social nuance, that’s what could happen. Insanity. I tilt my head, endeavour to adopt a normal smile. ‘Callidus is a Latin word. It means clever, dextrous, skilful, cunning.’

      He lowers his pen. ‘Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?’

      I rub my forehead, compose myself. I need to remain calm, somehow, stay steady, but it is relentless, all the talk and the words and the endless possibilities of meanings. I breathe in hard then pause. The air. Is it…is it paint? I sniff again to clarify, but I am certain. There is a smell of fresh paint in the room. It is strong and I don’t like it, the fumes contaminating my nostrils, my brain, overriding them with new senses to process. I glance to the ceiling. The cobwebs dangle in the breeze, yet they seem strangely rigid, plastic almost.

      Kurt coughs and I look over. He is staring at me now, chin lowered so his eyebrows appear thick, straight yet strangely transparent, liquefied.

      ‘Maria, do you trust in your recollection of events—of what was said during the incident with Michaela Croft in the cell?’

      I hesitate. ‘Yes. I…Of course.’

      ‘And what about her mentioning Father Reznik?’

      He clicks his pen, waits. I am struck by silence. If I tell him what I have discovered, what then? A diagnosis, an incorrect one? Again? Maybe I should tell him portions of what happened, maybe he can advise me. I rub my head one more time then drop my hand. ‘Michaela was not who she said she was.’

      ‘How do you know that?’

      I clasp my hands together, squeeze the fingers. I can do this. ‘This is all private in here, no? Doctor-patient confidentiality applies?’

      He nods, sits forward. ‘Yes. Of course.’

      I glance to the window, the swell of the curtains sweeping across the side of the room. ‘She was part of MI5,’ I say after a moment, my eyes locked on the curtains.

      ‘They knew the priest and I were investigating the whereabouts of Father Reznik. The priest discovered that Reznik didn’t exist, not as a name, not as a real person.’ I turn, face him, squeeze my palms to stay calm, tell myself to trust him. I am in therapy, therapy designed to help me. ‘I find myself not knowing if I killed the priest from the convent or if someone else did. I get…’ I pause, take a sip of water. ‘I get confused, sometimes.’

      ‘Maria,’ Kurt says now, soft, low, ‘you have to remember you were convicted of killing Father O’Donnell—a guilty verdict, prison. And I think the repercussions of the prison environment, for you, may be adding to your sense of…your sense of anxiety, perhaps, your confusion. Prison is a hard place to be. You have been through a lot already.’

      ‘But you know I am innocent,’ I say. ‘You know what happened in the…in the…’ I stop, a slap of reality hitting me hard. Innocent. Not guilty. The two terms suddenly seem alien, odd, two strangers in the street. I don’t know what I believe any more, what I am capable of. ‘They put Michaela in Goldmouth to keep an eye on me,’ I say now. ‘They put her in there to ensure I said nothing over Father Reznik, about what—who—he really was.’

      ‘And what is he?’

      I hesitate. ‘A retired intelligence officer.’

      Kurt shakes his head. ‘Maria, can you hear what you are saying? MI5? A Catholic priest a former intelligence officer? How can all that be? And besides—’ he pinches the bridge of his nose ‘—retired implies no longer active, no longer working.’

      ‘You don’t believe me?’

      He inhales, taps his pen. ‘I believe that you believe it. I believe that you have been through a very traumatic process for someone like you. It is common for people in your position to…fabricate stories. To merge fact with fiction to