Chapter 40 Nina

Chapter 40

?Nina

Nina hears the sound of orchestral music up ahead and follows it toward the next room.

Inside the white room stand three large tables, each with a small box placed on top of it. Nina walks toward them; the room seals behind her as she reaches the first of them.

"Welcome, Nina, to The Fire Sermon. The game will now commence."

A low hiss fills the room under the melody of the light classical music.

Gas; gas is being pumped in. Nina instinctually covers her nose and mouth but the sour, penetrating odor cuts through her clenched palm.

Nina spots the screen across the room and runs to it as words appear.

The gas you are now breathing is a nerve agent.

You have between 5 and 20 minutes before this fully takes effect.

On the tables in this room there are three boxes, each containing an injection: a potential antidote.

But only one of the syringes is live. The others are placebos. Choose wisely.

A timer replaces the text on the screen. One minute has already passed since the gas was administered.

Nina turns back to the tables and lifts each lid carefully, inside each nestles a loaded syringe. A small tag is attached to each. Nina reads then rereads them, her soul sinking inside her. Her father was a near clairvoyant at solving cryptic crossword clues, but she has never been as accomplished. She sounds them out loud.

The first reads: "Unscramble this: O Nontheist."

The second reads: "English rock band; to well preserve."

The third reads: "Choose what is inside mothers."

Nina coughs, her eyes suddenly itchy, her throat beginning to burn. It's happening. The gas is getting to her already, the hot scratch of it undeniable. The Fire Sermon.

Nina looks over at the screen. Two minutes have passed. The gas is potent and is beginning to hamper her.

She forces herself to focus.

Cryptic crossword clues have a strange system to them. She tries to remember it. They often contain the answer within the clue itself.

The first clue seems to suggest it's an anagram. Unscramble being the operative word. "Unscramble this: O Nontheist." Perhaps unscramble the words: O nontheist.

Nina squeezes her eyes shut and tries to concentrate, pushing away the burning itch of her eyes and throat, the letters of the clue scrambling around desperately in her mind, until they burst into order.

Not this one.

That's the answer. Not this one. That's what the letters spell out when rearranged; it is that simple if you know the rules. The answer is not in that syringe.

Emboldened, she turns to the next syringe. Three and a half minutes have passed.

The next clue looks to Nina likely to be a double-definition clue. Double-definition clues contain two different definitions of the word that is the answer.

"English rock band; to well preserve."

So what word is both the name of an English rock band and a way of preserving? The Jam immediately springs to Nina's mind.

But that doesn't make sense, does it? Jam?

Not this one is a pretty straightforward clue, but Jam means nothing to her.

No doubt it will make sense in light of the final clue, Nina tells herself. Because only one of the syringes is a real antidote. If she can work what two of the three clues are, the answer will present itself regardless.

The third syringe's tag reads: "Choose what is inside mothers."

The word inside gives the third clue away: this is a container clue.

Inside is the operative word: the answer will be literally inside the word mothers.

Mothers.

Others.

So, choose what is inside mothers. Others. Choose others.

The antidote is not in syringe three. Which means whatever Jam means it is the correct clue. Syringe two is the one she needs.

Nina picks up the syringe and looks at it.

"Bathsheba, how do I take it," she asks, her raised voice cracking and sending her into a sharply painful fit of coughing.

A diagram fills the screen across from her. She takes the syringe with her to the screen and watches as an illustrated figure slides their syringe into the skin of their upper thigh and depresses the plunger.

Nina winces at the image. A wave of faintness sweeps over her. She carefully sinks to the floor and places her head between her legs until it passes.

"Okay, okay," Nina tells herself as she pops off the syringe cap and sits up on the floor.

She takes a deep breath, the burning at the back of her throat intense now, then plunges the syringe into her upper thigh, administering the fluid within.

She sucks in a tight breath as she pulls it out, her skin snagging on the needle. Then as she waits for the medicine to take effect, she takes one last look at the tag before tossing it away.

She lets out a little chuckle as she reads the clue with fresh eyes. She finally has the answer.

It's not The Jam. It's The Cure.