Survival (13 page)

Stovorsky’s laptop whirred on the table in the centre of
the room, while he stood at the window, staring out.
His two support units had turned up only minutes after
he’d lost Jimmy in the streets of Tlon. He’d sent them
away almost immediately, but only after borrowing
enough equipment to set up a temporary operations
base in the top flat of a derelict block.

The only thing he hadn’t been able to requisition was
an air-conditioning unit. Instead all of his equipment was
gradually heating up the room. Opening the window only
seemed to add to the furnace.

“I thought nights in the desert were cold,” he
grumbled to himself.

He knew he had the option of changing out of his
suit, but this was work. And while he was at work he
would be dressed appropriately. It helped him to
separate his personal opinions from his professional
duties. He was serving his country. He should never
forget that and it helped to have a length of polyester
knotted around his neck. His raincoat was on the back
of the door and his suit jacket was draped over a chair.

He looked down to the alleyway and watched his driver in
the dim pool of a streetlight, making the necessary repairs
to the PVP. Then his laptop ‘pinged’. With a sigh, he went
over to it and brought up a small video window, in which
the head and shoulders of a man were waiting for him.

The image wasn’t perfectly clear and the movements
were jerky, but the man was instantly recognisable. His
face was almost perfectly round, his mouth emphasised
by a neat blonde moustache.

“Clear channel?” he said sharply.

Stovorsky picked up a small black rectangle from the
table and roughly slotted it into the USB drive. “Clear,”
he announced wearily. “Go ahead.”

“I’ve met with Helen Coates,” said the other man,
speaking quickly and evenly. “Standing as a charity
representative, I made contact and determined that her
appeal for help on behalf of her friends, the Muzbekes,
was genuine. If we do decide to help her, her gratitude
could be useful in the long run.”

“I know all this,” Stovorsky groaned. “It was in your
report. Emails do reach Africa, you know.”

“But there’s been a development.”

“Well?” Stovorsky slumped back and roughly rolled up
the sleeves of his shirt.

“I’ve been contacted by Christopher Viggo.”

Stovorsky stopped what he was doing and leaned
over the keyboard.

“He wants a meeting,” the moustache man went on.

“Did he say where?”

“King’s Cross. At an old ice house on Wharfdale
Road.”

Both men sat silently for a few seconds. Only the
hum of the laptop filled the room.

“We could set up the meeting,” the moustache man
suggested eventually, “then trade the information with
NJ7. Miss Bennett would be very grateful to us. It
might even prevent further British attacks on French
assets. It could—”

“Wait!” Stovorsky snapped, “I’m thinking!” He slowly
dragged both hands over his scalp, smoothing down the
thin wisps of hair, soaked in sweat.

“No,” he announced at last. “Nothing would give me
more pleasure than to dump that man into severe
trouble, but Viggo’s not stupid. He knew this request
would come back to me. He’s testing us. He wants to see
whether we’ll support him when he tries to overthrow
the British Government.”

“And will we?”

“How do I know?” Stovorsky barked. “The point is we
can’t betray Viggo. Not yet. He’ll know it’s a possibility
and he’ll protect himself against it somehow. It wouldn’t
work. We’d gain nothing from NJ7 and Viggo would
never come to us again.”

“So what do you suggest?”

“A powerful man is asking for our help.”

“He’s not powerful,” scoffed the moustache man.

“Not yet,” Stovorsky corrected him. “But he could be
soon. He could be the future of Britain, and if he is, we
want him to be grateful to France.”

“So should I meet him?”

“No.” Stovorsky held up a finger to emphasise his
point. “He’s powerful and he’s dangerous.”

“But you just said—”

“Someone should meet him, but not you. We can’t
trust him. I’ll send someone who can defend themselves
if there’s trouble.”

The man with the moustache was indignant. “I’m a
trained agent!” he protested. “I’m highly dangerous!”

“I can only see your head and shoulders,” replied
Stovorsky, “but you still manage to look overweight.” He
shook his head in exasperation while his colleague glanced
down to examine his waistline and tried to suck in his belly.

“I’m sending Zafi,” Stovorsky announced. “Jimmy’s
family isn’t going anywhere – NJ7 will make sure of that.
So she can leave them for now, meet Viggo, then go
back later if she needs to.”

“What do you mean?” The moustache man stared
into the camera. “About the family?”

“Nothing.” Stovorsky sighed. “It’s just we’re having a
slight… problem. Jimmy’s… it doesn’t matter. You can
leave this with me. I’ll take it from here.”

They ended the conversation quickly and in under
ninety seconds Stovorsky was decrypting an email
attachment containing details of a proposed meeting with
Christopher Viggo. With new energy, he straightened his
tie and rolled his shoulders several times. Then he
opened a fresh document. It was time to send Zafi her
new instructions, then get out of Africa. Somebody else
could run about in the heat for a change.

Zafi snapped out of her sleep with a flood of images in
her head – the flat where she was staying the night, a
rough schematic outline of the whole estate, the light
on her mobile phone softly glowing in the darkness…
For a second they were outshone by the brightest of
them all – a flash of something from her dream. But
then it was gone, forgotten forever. Her dreams always
vanished like that.

She rolled off the sofa, slipping out from under the
blanket. Still she didn’t let her guard down and kept her
hoodie covering her face. It was cold and the only noise
was the occasional
thrum
of a car or night bus going
past the window. The lights flared through the gap
where the curtains didn’t quite meet.

Zafi grabbed her phone and felt a knot of anxiety
forming in her chest. A new message. Her thumb hovered
over the button. Was this the kill order? A part of her
thrilled to the idea, while the rest wanted to shut it out
completely. If it was, she would obey. She had always
followed orders and always would.
It’s how I’m made
, she
told herself. At the same time she knew that somewhere
out there was a boy made just the same way as her, but
who didn’t follow orders when he didn’t like them.

She opened her message. The seemingly random
sequence of letters and numbers jumped into her head,
taking new form as it travelled, as if to her it was
written in 3-D and could dance to form new shapes.

Viggo?
She was suddenly awash with a strange mixture
of confusion and relief that she didn’t want to admit
existed.
And not to kill, but to talk?
It seemed simple
enough, but Zafi didn’t like it. Why was the DGSE using her
as a messenger all of a sudden? She thought she was
their most potent weapon. Recently they’d sent her to
try to kill the British Prime Minister. Were her doubts
stronger than she thought? Had they started to show?

No
, she reassured herself.
Impossible. They’ll want
me to kill somebody soon. Everything will go back to the
way it was
. Even as she gave herself this pep-talk, there
was a growl of terror in her heart.

A second later she was up and could feel new
strength pumping through her. She was about to dash
out of the front door, but stopped herself. She stood,
frozen, staring at the half-finished Monopoly game still
set out on the coffee table. What if the DGSE did send
her a new kill order? And what if the targets were the
other people asleep in this flat?

* * *

The iron lattice gate on Wharfdale Road rattled as Zafi
climbed over it, but at 4.00 a.m. there was nobody around
to notice. She hurried to the end of the narrow alley, where
there was an opening in the brickwork and a dark stairway.

Years ago there had been an Ice House Museum
here, offering an experience of London’s Victorian age,
when ships brought Norwegian ice up the canals to this
spot. Some of the museum paraphernalia still survived.
Zafi hurried down, past the welcome signs and broken
fittings, all thick with dust and cobwebs.

The further down she went, the more she shivered
and the more the stench in the air grew. At some point
since the museum had closed the drains must have
leaked into the ice house.
Smells like British cheese
,
she thought. She felt a faint buzz in her head as her
night-vision came into operation.

She jumped off the last step and landed with a slight
splash at the bottom of the ice house. Now she could
appreciate why visitors had once paid to see the place.
It was much bigger than she’d expected, with Victorian
graffiti carved into the brick walls.

“Chris!” she called out playfully. “Viggy!” She loved the
way her voice bounced around the pit.

Suddenly a hand clamped over her mouth. “Are you
alone?” came a hiss in her ear. The breath was hot.

Zafi’s muscles jolted as if her veins were carrying
lightning. She dropped into a perfect splits, her heels
sliding through the slime. In the same moment, she
grabbed the wrist of the hand at her mouth and rotated
her shoulders with the torsion of an aeroplane propeller.
A black heap rolled over her shoulder, but instead of
landing with a splat, the man controlled his fall and
skidded across the mud.

“You move well for an old man, Viggo,” Zafi called
out. “And yes – I’m alone.”

“Keep your voice down,” came the whispered reply.
Then there was the groan of a battered man getting up
from the floor. “We’d better move.”

A few seconds later they were walking through a tunnel
complex that no visitor to the museum had ever seen – low
underground passages that had been used to transport
the ice across London to the major railway stations. Some
of the tunnels were severely dilapidated and they were
squirming with rats, but it was obvious Viggo had recently
cleared certain areas to make them passable.

“I know people who are looking for you,” Zafi told him,
following a few steps behind Viggo. “Apart from the
Government, I mean.” She wasn’t sure, but Zafi thought
she saw Viggo shrug. “Helen Coates,” she said.

“Is she…?” came a croaky whisper back up the
tunnel. But then it died. “They mustn’t come,” he said in
a stronger voice. “You mustn’t…”

“It’s not why I’m here.”

They walked on in silence. Zafi counted the paces as
they walked, calculating the distance as well as noting
every slight shift in direction. Without her even wanting
it, a map of their route was taking shape in her head.
On top of that, her imagination superimposed a map of
the streets above them.
We’re heading for King’s Cross
Station
, she realised.

Only a few minutes later they came out into what
looked like an empty storeroom. They’d entered through
the back entrance and there was another door on the
opposite side of the room. Zafi worked out where it
must lead: an unoccupied retail concession at St
Pancras International terminal.

It was warmer in here and the lights were on. It was
also a relief not to have to put up with the smell any
more. Zafi wasn’t surprised to see that Viggo had
furnished his new home with the essentials. The empty
shelf racks were pushed against the walls to make
space for a heater, a large mattress and several
blankets laid across the floor.

Zafi looked straight to the mattress. There, sitting up
against a rack, with a blanket across her lap and her
arm in a sling, was Viggo’s girlfriend.

“Saffron Walden,” Zafi gasped. “I heard you were dead.”

The woman smiled calmly and it was one of the
warmest smiles Zafi had ever seen. Her dark skin
seemed to glow. The harsh strip lights emphasised
the fullness of her lips while her tousled black hair
framed her face in an oval.

“I nearly was,” she said softly, and Zafi couldn’t help
smiling at the richness of Saffron’s voice. “I was shot by
an NJ7 agent at the French Embassy.”

“I know,” Zafi answered quietly. “I was there.”

Viggo and Saffron stared at her. “You were there?”
Viggo asked in amazement.

Zafi just shrugged.

“So much for history,” she said, then carried on
quickly. “Shouldn’t you be in a hospital?”

“I’ve healed well enough, thanks,” said Saffron firmly.
“I’m not as frail as I look.” She raised an eyebrow and
lifted her good arm from under the blanket. She was
clutching a rifle.

“Going on a hunting trip?”

“Kids!” cried Viggo, with a grunt of exasperation.
“Why did they send a child?”

“They didn’t,” Zafi protested. “They sent an agent.”

She studied Viggo’s face. He looked more rugged
than in images on the news or surveillance photographs.
His soft brown eyes seemed to glint a little more and his
stubble was a little more unkempt. His hair was longer
too. For a second Zafi was distracted by thinking about
how she would disguise his strong features.

Saffron’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts. “We need
to know we have the support of the French,” she said.

“I’ll pass on the message,” Zafi replied casually and
turned to leave.

“No,” Viggo blurted. He grabbed Zafi’s shoulder and
spun her round. “You’ll pass on
this
message: Britain’s
Neo-democratic Government is going to come to an end.
Soon. I’m going to end it. Whether you French like it or
not, this country will soon have free and democratic
leadership. I plan for it to be me, and when it is I’ll
support French interests – trade, diplomacy, migration…
everything.” His eyes burned into Zafi’s. “That will happen
much more quickly if I can count on French support now.
Tell Uno Stovorsky to forget what happened between us
in the past. Like you said – it’s history, right? We have a
common enemy now. I need France as my friend.”