Deadfall: Agent 21 (14 page)

A minute passed. The girl placed her handiwork
to her right, then started all over again, stuffing another toy and sewing it up.

Zak counted thirty-two children doing exactly the same work. The piles on their left grew smaller. The piles on their right grew larger. And all the while, the guards walked among them, carrying assault rifles and wearing insolent, aggressive looks on their scarred faces.

One of the workers put up his hand. Instantly, two of the armed guards stalked towards him. They spoke for a moment, then one of the guards whacked the worker hard against the side of his head with the butt of his rifle. The other guard shouted something, his voice curt and aggressive, the sound reaching Zak above the treetops. The kid sat up again, head bowed, and carried on working. The two guards laughed and continued their rounds.

Zak had to fight back an urge not to yell out at these two bullies from where he was. But he reminded himself why he was here. He’d be doing nobody any favours by getting captured now.

Then came a commotion on the far side of the camp, just outside the gates where there was a rough jungle path leading up to them. It was clear for about twenty metres, then it disappeared into the rainforest. Approaching the camp along this road, Zak saw a group of people. He trained his scope on them.

There were eleven of them, all young boys with the exception of the man at the front. He had dark skin and grey hair tied back in dreadlocks, and Zak could make out a sour, arrogant expression on the man’s face. And although he had never seen him before, he felt a strange sensation as he watched him. Almost like recognition. It made his spine tingle unpleasantly.

The sound of more shouting drifted up into the treetops. The guards inside the camp gate conferred with each other for a moment, then one of them opened the gate while the other knelt down in the firing position, his gun aimed squarely at whoever was about to walk in. When he saw the man with dreadlocks, however, he lowered his gun. The newcomers filed inside and the guards fastened the gate again.

Zak continued to scan the camp. He hadn’t yet seen what he was looking for. He zeroed in on as many faces as he could find, but not one of them belonged to Cruz. There was no sign of his nemesis, no sign that they had successfully closed in on him.

Birdsong. It came from the forest floor. It repeated three times before Zak tore his eyes away from the camp, realizing that it wasn’t a real bird, but one of his companions down below. Almost regretfully, he lowered his scope.

Then, quickly, he raised it to his eyes again.

He had seen a glimpse of someone different. A woman. She had white skin and her hair was in a bob. She had stepped out from one of the buildings with one of the young guards at her side. But now that Zak looked again, she was gone.

He felt himself frowning. Had he recognized that woman’s face? He thought so. He racked his brain, trying to place her, but he couldn’t. Not for the life of him.

More fake birdsong from the forest floor. Zak stowed his scope, then arranged the rope over a thicker branch and lowered the ends down to the ground. He gave it a minute for Raf and Gabs to secure the ends, then prusiked back down from the treetops.

‘Well?’ Gabs whispered.

Zak explained what he’d seen.

‘But no sign of Cruz?’ Raf asked.

Zak shook his head. ‘None.’

‘We
need
to know if he’s there,’ Gabs said. She gave Raf a serious kind of look. ‘I’m going in.’

‘No way,’ said Raf. Gabs raised a dangerous eyebrow. ‘The camp is full of kids, Gabs. If anyone sees you, you’ll stick out like a . . . well, like an adult in a camp full of kids.’

Gabs’s face grew stony. ‘Before you even
suggest
it,’ she said, ‘we’re
not
sending Zak in there.’

‘It’s our only option,’ Raf said. ‘Unless you think we should send Malcolm in.’

They looked over at Malcolm, who was slumped against the base of a tree, sweat pouring off him, glasses slipping down his nose. He looked like he was talking to himself.

‘Of
course
not,’ Gabs hissed. ‘But if you think I’m going to sit around out here while Zak risks—’

‘Er, excuse me,’ Zak interrupted, raising one finger. ‘Do I get a say in this?’

Gabs glowered at him.

‘It makes sense for me to go,’ he said. ‘If I wait for nightfall, I’ll have a chance of getting over the walls unseen.’

‘They’ve got personal comms,’ Gabs objected. ‘You saw it with your own eyes. It’ll only take one of them to see you and the whole camp will know you’re there.’

‘I can help with that,’ Malcolm said in a small voice.

Gabs’s face grew even darker as the three of them turned round to look at him. ‘
How?
’ she almost growled.

Malcolm reached inside his rucksack. He pulled out the tangled mess of circuit board and wires that Zak had seen him pack when they left Jo’burg. ‘I made this myself,’ he said. His voice trembled
slightly, and Zak noticed that his hand was shaking. Was infection setting in? ‘I carry it everywhere. You never know when you might need it. Once, I thought someone was following me and I—’

‘What
is
it, Malcolm?’ Raf interrupted.

Malcolm blinked, then made eye contact, not with Raf but with Zak. ‘It’s a cellphone jammer,’ he said. ‘You see, if the guards are using short-wave radio frequencies to talk to each other, I can just set this dial and their radios won’t work any more.’

‘They’ll get suspicious,’ Gabs said immediately.

‘I don’t think so, Gabs,’ Raf disagreed. ‘Radio comms fail all the time, and for all sorts of reasons. I think it’s a good idea, if Malcolm can be sure it’ll work.’

‘Of
course
it’ll work,’ Malcolm muttered. He sounded rather offended.

Gabs was looking around almost in desperation now. ‘Well, I don’t see how he’s going to get inside. The walls are too high, the gate’s guarded . . .’

‘Actually, I’ve got an idea,’ said Raf. ‘Zak will be able to scale those walls in a matter of minutes. Easier and quicker than you and me, in fact, because he’s lighter.’

Gabs looked from Raf, to Zak, then back to Raf again. ‘
Fine!
’ she hissed. ‘Just . . . just . . .
fine
!’ She stomped off, fuming, to the edge of the jungle.

Twenty seconds passed before Raf dragged his eyes away from Gabs and turned to Zak. ‘Do me a favour, mate,’ he said. ‘Don’t get yourself caught.’

‘I wasn’t planning to.’

‘Good. Because if you do, I’ll seriously never hear the end of it.’

As they waited for nightfall, Raf kept busy.

He found two pieces of wood on the forest floor, about the right size for Zak to grip them firmly. Then he took the six-inch nails that had pinned the warning dolls to the trees. With a heavy, flat stone, he hammered one nail through each piece of wood, then bent each one down at a right angle about an inch from the point.

‘Hold these,’ he told Zak. ‘The nails need to point out and down.’

Zak did as he was told.

‘You can use these to climb the fencing,’ Raf explained. ‘Just use the nail to hook onto the holes in the mesh. We kept you in good shape back at the island – you should be strong enough to keep holding them.’

‘What if I let go?’ Zak asked.

‘I wouldn’t do that. This isn’t really the time and place for a broken leg.’

Point taken
, thought Zak.

Like the night before, night fell quickly. This time, though, they had no fire. With the camp just metres away, it would be too much of a risk. But it was far from pitch black. A glow from the camp itself gave Zak and the others just enough light to see by.

Just after midnight, Raf stood up from where they were huddled in a circle. He sniffed the air. ‘We’re going to get more rain,’ he said. ‘It’ll probably send everyone inside the camp into their buildings. That would be a good time to scale the wall. Agreed?’

Zak nodded. His mouth was dry with fear and excitement. He stood up too, clutching his improvised grappling hooks.

‘Remember, Zak. All you need to do is confirm that Cruz is there, then get out. Once we know his location, we can work on our next move.’

Almost instantly they heard the sound of raindrops hitting the canopy. Seconds later, the skies had opened.

It was suddenly too noisy to speak. Zak simply shook Raf’s hand and gave Gabs a hug, before dumping his rucksack at her feet – it would only slow him down. She mouthed the words ‘Be careful!’, then hugged him again. Malcolm was sheltering under his rucksack, fiddling with his short-wave radio jammer. He was paying no
attention to Zak, who now hurried through the dark, sodden rainforest towards the clearing where the camp stood.

He was able to approach it with ease, because the tall logs that formed the solid part of the perimeter wall stopped anyone looking out just as well as preventing anyone from looking in. His clothes were saturated now, and water gushed down his face and into his eyes, but he didn’t let it slow him down. Clutching his grappling hooks firmly, he stretched both arms out as high as he could and hooked himself onto the mesh fencing.

He felt his biceps flex as he pulled the weight of his own body a few centimetres higher, then loosened his right grappling hook. He stretched up his right arm and hooked onto a higher mesh hole, before repeating the process for his left hand. He peered upwards, squinting against the driving rain that now streamed down his neck. He reckoned he had another five or six metres before he reached the top of the wooden logs. Then he would have about four metres of just mesh. Which meant he’d be on display. He needed to scale it before the rainstorm stopped.

He yanked himself further up. Already, his arms were burning from hauling the weight of his body. But it was a feeling he was used to from the regular,
punishing fitness regimes Raf and Gabs had put him through back on St Peter’s Crag. There had been times when he’d wondered why it was necessary for them to keep pushing him to the very edge of his ability. Now he understood the reason. He was totally relying on his own strength, and it gave him confidence to know that his fitness levels were high.

The rain started falling more heavily. Zak was awash. It pounded on his head and stung his face, making it difficult to breathe without snorting in water. Still he continued climbing. All his attention was on the hooks, and slotting them correctly into the mesh. A single mistake and he’d be hurtling to the ground, a jumbled mess of broken bones.

His right arm reached a level with the top of the log wall. Very carefully, very slowly, he pulled himself up so that he could peer over the top of the solid, interior part of the wall.

It was difficult to see, because the rain was so thick. But a sudden flash of lightning came to his aid. It lasted only a fraction of a second, but it was enough to tell Zak that Raf had been right. The storm had sent everyone indoors. There didn’t even appear to be any guards at the gate.

Grab your chance while you have it
, he told himself.
Move!

Zak started grappling his way up even faster. The
mesh fencing wobbled and he was sure it was making a dreadful noise. He thanked God for the rain: it wasn’t just masking him, it was masking any sounds he made.

He was at the top of the fence now, holding on carefully as he raised one precarious leg over the top.

He slipped.

He immediately clamped his left grappling hook against the top line of mesh. He caught himself just in time, but now he was hanging precariously by just his left hand. He gripped at the block of wood for all he was worth. He was sideways on to the mesh fencing now and suddenly the whole sky lit up with another momentary but massive flash of lightning.

He wondered if Raf and Gabs could see him silhouetted against the fence.

Then, suddenly, his heart stopped.

The scene had changed.

Six figures were facing the fence. They were arranged around him in a semicircle, each one about fifteen metres away.

Get out of here!

Zak swung his right arm around, trying to hook the fence. No luck. He was still hanging by one arm.

Another flash of lightning. The figures were still in a semicircle, only this time they were nearer. Ten metres.

They were closing in.

Panic surged through him. He made another desperate attempt to hook the fence with his right hand.

Disaster!

The grappling hook hit the fence at an awkward angle. It fell from his hand.

In what felt like slow motion, he saw it hurtle through the rain-filled air by the light of another streak of lightning. He desperately tried to catch it, and came agonizingly close – he felt the wood brush against his wet fingertips. But then time sped up again, and it tumbled to the earth.

The figures were only five metres away. And two of them had raised their weapons to point in Zak’s direction.

Zak scrambled, trying to worm the fingers of his free hand into the small holes of the mesh fencing, but it was impossible. The holes were just too small.

A sudden, more brutal, lashing of rain crashed against him. He felt his left hand slipping. He knew he couldn’t hold onto the remaining grappling hook for much longer. Not that it mattered, because any second he expected to hear the retort of an assault rifle firing a round into his body.

A round that would surely kill him.

He looked down. There was a two-metre drop to
the top of the log wall. In the instant before he let go of the remaining hook, he focused on it, leaning his body back towards the mesh so that, when he hit it, he had room to bend his knees and a chance of keeping his balance on the top and not falling the full ten metres to the ground.

His hand finally lost its hold and he fell. His feet slammed against the top of the wall. He was about to topple, but at the last moment steadied himself.

His back was against the mesh now. He was looking into the camp and although it was raining more heavily than ever, he could still see the figures standing in the semicircle below him. One of them stepped forward. He seemed taller than the rest and although Zak couldn’t really make out his features, he recognized his gait as he walked.