Chapter 1 It was only a few steps from the main street, but the dark alley seemed remote and ancient. John's eyes adjusted to the dark slowly, and for a few seconds he imagined he saw a looming figure in a pile of rotting rubbish bags until his eyes adjusted. He hefted the crowbar in his hand and grinned at himself. This place was deserted, just as he had hoped. He moved quickly but quietly down the slant of light from the street into the recesses of the alley, and found the doorway he had inspected in the daytime. It had probably been the tradesman's entrance to the large insurance building facing the street, and a hundred years ago the servants would have taken in bread and crates of wine at this doorway. But it was dark and boarded up now, a heavy rusted padlock sealing that time against the modern age. John inserted the crowbar into the loop of the lock, but as he did so, it fell to the ground with a dull clunk. Surely it wasn't so rusty it was ready to fall off? He picked it up, and inspected it. It looked like it had been recently forced, the rusty plate was scratched back to clean metal which shone in the dim light. The hasp on the door was folded back, he noticed. The padlock hadn't been securing the door at all, someone had imply hooked it back onto the dangling hasp. He was sure the lock had been secure earlier that day. He threw it into the rubbish and pushed the big wooden panelled door, expecting a horror house shriek, but the door was silent and the dark rectangle of the quiet building showed no light within. He was glad he'd brought a torch, and dug it out of the pocket of his bulky jacket. The floor betrayed many footprints, layers of them upon layers. This passage must not have been used in years. At the end of the short corridor, he found another padlock on the floor, and the door ajar. This door led out into a plush modern office, with open plan desks and computers flickering away in the night. A set of large plate windows looked onto the main street, and he knew he was vulnerable as long as he was on this floor. He kept close to the wall, in case some late night security guard or cleaner was on the prowl, and sidled along towards the front of the building where he knew the stairs were. Once away from the street level and the fishbowl windows, John made steady progress up the flights of stairs. The steps were carpeted and the handrail was continuous around the central shaft, so he felt comfortable with the torch off. As he reached the top, he flicked it back on to look for the roof access. High in the corner was a fixed ladder leading up to a trapdoor. Holding the strap of the rubber torch between his teeth, he jumped up to the bottom rung of the ladder and pulled himself up, hand over hand, until he could get his feet on the rungs. The trapdoor had a bolt fastener, but it was undone, and he used the top of his head to push the door open as he climbed out. The air was cooler outside, and the bitumen roof absorbed the sound of his footsteps. Around him, the city crowded like a Roman ampitheatre, and what he was about to do merited such an audience. He found his bearings and began creeping towards the front of the building, aware that there was no hand rail and that in the dark he might come across the precipice sooner than expected. He became aware of the sound of breathing first. The sky was moonless, and the streetlights were below roof level and cast no light on his footsteps. He froze, and as his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he could make out the figure of a man standing on the front edge of the roof, facing away from him, his breathing laboured and exaggerated. Did he even know John was there? "You won't talk me out of it." Briefly, John considered retreating into the dark and abandoning his plan. This was an unexpected and an unwelcome development. He hadn't wanted any witnesses for his first time, and he didn't want a suicidal nut to bring police and reporters. But the man went on. "You shouldn't try to grab for me. I mean it." "I won't.", he said. "I'm not even here for you. I didn't think anybody would be up here." The man's head flicked round nervously. "Come round the side, so I can see you. But don't get too close. I don't know what you're after but if you grab at me, you'll end up going over with me." John walked round to the left in a semi-circle, keeping a few yards away from the man perched on the edge. The roof was edged with a low wall a foot high and the same wide. It was on this the man stood, and John sat down on the wall, keeping his weight awkwardly to the inside when he saw how high up they were. The street below was quiet and well lit. "I suppose it's stupid of me to ask if you plan to jump?" The man turned to face him and smiled. "Of course I'm going to jump. I was just working up to it when you arrived. So if you don't mind, can you just go?" "Can I ask why?" "Don't try to talk me out of it, I told you. You're not interested in me, you just don't want a mess, like all of them." John shook his head. "I told you, I'm not here for you." "Yeah, sure. Just a coincidence." "I'm not. I was here this morning to scope out this building for something of my own. I came up here tonight expecting the place to myself. But now that you're here, I would rather you didn't jump. But if you're going to, can you give me a bit of time to get clear of here? I don't want to get caught up with police and stuff." The man laughed. "You're alright." John shrugged. "Just selfish, I suppose. You've got your problems, and all that. I probably can't help you with them. I came here to do something else, something that would be hard to explain to the police. If you go over now, there will be questions. I'd rather you didn't." "What's your name, man?" "John. John Topley." "Well John, I'm Tony, and every day I'm getting better and better. Only I'm not." John could tell that the man called Tony was unstable, and he felt a genuine desire not to get wrapped up in another city statistic. "Well Tony, nice to meet you and all that. But I think I'll go fnd myself another roof." Tony laughed again, this time more warmly. "You are really not here to talk me down?" John shook his head. "Then what in hell's name are you doing up here?" John shrugged and pulled his large padded jacket around him in the chill. "It doesn't matter." "Ah, secrets. You've got secrets, I've got secrets. Secrets are good. Secrets are what separate us from ...them. But tell me anyway, I'm going to be dead in a minute, so humour a walking corpse." "You wouldn't believe me anyway, or you would think I was having a sick joke at you. I really wish you wouldn't jump. Surely things aren't that bad?" Tony laughed. "For people like me, things don't need to be bad to be bad." He looked at John's puzzled expression. "I'm broken in here." he pointed to his head. "When I feel sad and happy, it's got nothing to do with what's happening outside. The chemicals in my brain are all shot to hell." "And there's nothing the doctors can do?" Tony shook his head. "They can pump you with stuff that takes the edges off. You don't feel sad, and you don't feel happy. You just get squeezed in the middle and you don't feel anything. I don't take that shit, it's worse than death. I need the real deal, the snap. I need black and calm and nothing. If you've never wanetd to die, you can't understand. I'm scared of the act, but not of the after. That's the only reason I'm talking to you. I'm scared." John paused, looking out over the buildings, and could find no answer. "So why tonight?" "What?" "Why jump tonight? Why not next week, next year?" "Oh I jump every night. In here." he pointed to his head again. "It's just that tonight I plan to do it for real too before I hurt anybody else." His voice cracked at that. "There's a girl... oh never mind." "Don't you think she would hurt more if you died?" Tony ignored it. "So that's my secret, man. You have to tell me yours now, that's the deal." John almost told him. "No secret really. I just like it up here, the night and the quiet. That's why I have my big jacket on." He puffed his shoulders to demonstrate. "Looks warm." "It is. Here, you want to put it on?" Tony laughed. "You can't keep a corpse warm, and I'm going to be down there in a minute and won't need it. Keep it, man." John unzipped the jacket. "I'd like it if you put it on. I'm not going to try to stop you, you do what you have to. I'll put it down on the ledge and walk away. You put it on. I won't try to stop you." Tony smiled. "You're alright, John man, you really are. You're worried about me being cold, that's just fucked up enough to make sense to me." John took off the jacket and fumbled with a pin badge on the front breast. He hoped he'd worked the height out correctly, but was sure he had. It could still go badly wrong. He put the jacket down on the ledge and retreated back to the trap door. Tony hopped down and picked up the jacket. "What kind of jacket is this, it weighs a ton!" He slipped it on and did up the zip, much to John's relief. There were no guarantees, especially if it wasn't zipped. Tony stepped back up to the ledge, facing backwards towards where John was waiting. "Thanks, man." He stepped off backwards into the night.