Before Anthony could ask Hyde what was happening, he was then shown clips of his family disembarking nine hours later in London and making their way through customs channels. Finally, and as they were about to exit with their luggage, border force staff and armed uniformed police officers ushered them into a side room where their suitcases were searched. Jada’s contained a handful of canisters that, when opened, revealed dozens of transparent bags of pills.
‘Some contain amphetamines, others were stuffed with opiates and the rest Oxycodone,’ Hyde explained before Anthony had the opportunity to ask. ‘Total street value, approximately a hundred and twenty thousand. And you know how seriously our Government takes the smuggling of prescription medication, much more so than street drugs. Prison sentences are mandatory.’
‘No!’ yelled Anthony. ‘This is bullshit. Why are you doing this to them? Where are they now?’
‘Well, your wife is still being interviewed by police. But I’m afraid poor Matthew didn’t react well to being separated from his mother. He was clearly agitated, so, for his own safety, he was taken to the psychiatric ward of a private medical facility where he’s currently being monitored.’
The next image to appear on-screen was that of Matthew lying on a bed in a room, alone. His eyes were shut and arms and legs secured with restraints attached to the metal sidings.
‘My son . . .’ choked Anthony.
‘I know, tragic, isn’t it? Apparently, the only way to calm him down was to sedate him. Ironic, considering your dislike of medicating children.’
‘Henry, you don’t need to do this,’ Anthony begged. ‘Let them go and I’ll give you what you want. I’ll stay on this project or any other one for as long as you want me.’
‘But that’s the problem, I don’t want you. Not any more.’
‘No, it’s not too late . . .’
‘You like to think of yourself as a history buff, don’t you, Anthony? Do you know much about the Soviet Union in the nineteen-thirties?’
‘Henry . . .’
‘Apparently during Stalin’s purges, it wasn’t just traitors who were arrested, but their families too. It was commonplace for them to be convicted and executed on the flimsiest of evidence. They paid the ultimate price for the wrongdoings of their loved ones. We should be grateful that we don’t live in such unfair times.’
‘Please, don’t hurt them. They don’t deserve this.’ Anthony couldn’t take his eyes off Matthew. He would do anything to free him. ‘Just take the memory stick. Have me arrested; I don’t care how long I get.’
‘The stick is now inconsequential. It’s already been remotely erased.’
‘Then why are you doing this?’
He paused between each word. ‘Because. I. Can.’
Matthew’s image faded and a map reappeared, with an alternate destination to the one Anthony had programmed. He looked from the windscreen, only now realizing he was no longer travelling along New Northampton’s roads but the M1 motorway. He pressed the cancel route icon but the map remained unchanged. He jabbed at the rest of the screen and then at the ignition button but the car failed to respond. Instead, it accelerated. It was no longer under his control. As a last resort he yanked at the handles but they wouldn’t open. And the standard toughened safety glass of the windows was impervious to his fists and feet.
‘Where are you taking me?’ he asked as his car both overtook and undertook other vehicles with frightening proximity. Both hands clutched the side of his seat as he willed the car to slow down.
‘You’re not going anywhere,’ Hyde replied calmly.
‘You’ve taken over my car so you must be sending me somewhere?’
Anthony glanced at the speedometer. It was approaching the 110mph mark. Other autonomous vehicles were moving their occupants swiftly into different lanes to avoid an accident.
‘Henry!’ he shouted.
‘You’re a traitor, Anthony,’ Hyde said. If Anthony didn’t know him better, he might have sensed a touch of melancholy in his tone. ‘To yourself, to your family, to your country and, most importantly, to me. For fifteen years I had your best interests at heart. I was more of a parent to you than your absent father or insane mother ever were. I told myself your crisis of confidence was a blip, an error in judgement, that you’d see sense in the end. And I gave you a second chance, which is not something I make a habit of doing. But I was wrong and you let me down. And I take that very personally. So now it’s Matthew and Jada who will pay for your mistakes.’
‘We can work this out!’ he yelled but Hyde didn’t reply. Anthony repeated his name over and over again, only to be greeted by silence. He was alone.
Thoughts raced through his head of his mother’s short life, how much of his own life he had wasted, the time he should have spent with his family and how, given another opportunity, he would change so much. He could picture so clearly the palm tree-lined beaches of Saint Lucia he’d left behind a lifetime ago and how tantalizingly close they were to being within his grasp.
Instead, Anthony was helpless as the car swerved from the fourth lane into the third, then the second and the first. And, in a flash, he knew where the car was taking him and what Hyde had planned.
Within view was the spot where his mother had finally given in to her psychosis and ended her life. As Anthony’s vehicle ploughed through a crash barrier, his seatbelt remotely ejected.
The next handful of seconds passed too quickly for him to process. He didn’t feel pain as the car collided with the bridge and began to crumple, he felt nothing when he was hurled head-first through the windscreen with a burst of glass confetti. He didn’t feel his shoulder blades and vertebrae shatter as they hit the bonnet. And there was no pain when his head took the brunt of the concrete pillar. By the time his body came to rest on the grass verge, he was already dead.
ACT 3
