Survival (20 page)

Viggo tried to laugh, but it came out as if he was
about to choke.

“How’s Saffron?” asked Georgie, directing the
question to Viggo, but staring at her mum.

“She’s—” Viggo froze. He’d heard something. He
peered round the side of the stand and his eyes
widened. “Were you followed?”

“No,” said Helen, the tension in her throat forcing
her voice out too loud. “I—”

Suddenly one of the small metal tables came flying
towards them. Viggo shielded his head just in time, but
the table crashed into him and knocked him to the ground.

“Get out of the station,” he shouted. “Now!” He
pushed himself up and sprinted away towards the
centre of the concourse. Felix peered after him and was
stunned at what he saw. The customers in front of the
pub backed away in shock. In their centre was a burly
thirteen-year-old boy, brandishing a metal chair.

“Mitchell!” Felix gasped.

Viggo powered towards the assassin, who stood
firm, waiting for the perfect moment to swing, like a
baseball player poised to smash a fast-ball out of the
park. Mitchell whipped the chair towards Viggo’s head.
At the last instant, Viggo bent his knees and leaned
backwards, but carried on gliding across the floor. He
was at such an extreme angle that his body was almost
horizontal. He slid through underneath the chair, leaving
a look of shock and confusion on Mitchell’s face.

It was a second before Felix realised that Viggo’s
trainers were heelies, with wheels in their soles. “That
is so cool,” he whispered.

“Come on,” said Helen. “Let’s go.”

Jimmy felt like the whole world was fighting to break into
his skull, while his brain was bursting to get out. He’d
been thrown out of his seat, but he wasn’t sure where he
was – somewhere sprawled on the floor of the cockpit. At
last he regained focus and found himself face to face with
a pile of actinium. The dread charged through him again.

“Jimmy!” he heard. “Help me!”

He looked up. Marla was wrestling with the
flightstick and flicking switches in panic. But Jimmy’s
mind was sluggish. Something was holding him back –
slowing his thoughts and draining the energy from his
muscles.
It’s the radiation poisoning
, he told himself.
It’s killing me and I can’t stop it
.

But at the same time he knew that couldn’t be true.
Not yet. He could feel his body fighting with itself. His
assassin’s instinct kicked and writhed in his chest. It
would never give up. The only thing stopping him was this
feeling of utter hopelessness that swamped his heart.

“Come on!” yelled Marla.

Jimmy heard it as a distant cry. He closed his eyes.
He couldn’t stop seeing the faces of his sister, his mum
and Felix. What was happening to them? Then he saw
another face – his father’s.

“Jimmy!” Marla screamed. “You’ve got to get to
Britain!”

Jimmy jumped back to the controls. Out of the front of
the chopper he watched the waves, coiling like thousands
of huge black serpents jumping up to bite them.

He threw the flightstick up and to the side, suddenly
reversing the direction of the lift in the rotors. The
bank of air rolled the helicopter over on to its side then,
just at the right split-second, Jimmy jammed the heel
of his hand into the flightstick and the whole machine
flipped back the right way up.

“You OK?” Jimmy shouted.

Marla was clinging to her seat, but she was smiling.

“I’m going to get them off our tail,” Jimmy called out,
sending the chopper swooping low to the water. He didn’t
need to check the systems to know that the two planes
were close above them and ready to fire again. Jimmy
flicked the cover off one of the rocket launch switches
and before Marla could respond, he clicked the switch.

A rocket burst out from the left side of the chopper.
In less than a second it dived into the water. Three
seconds later it detonated on the sea bed. A wall of
water erupted in front of them, but they carried on
straight into it. The upsurge lifted them higher. Jimmy
never lost control.

“What are you doing?” Marla cried out.

“I’m going to get as close to the planes as I can,”
Jimmy replied. “I want them to see me.”

Mitchell spun round and hurtled across the station
concourse towards Viggo. He powered through
onlookers like a giant bowling ball.

Then he came face to face with a policeman.

“Clear the area!” the man shouted. Mitchell stopped
and looked around. The police were closing in on the
centre of the concourse like a net, hurrying bystanders
out of the way. Viggo was trapped in the middle, but
already he had seen his escape route. Hardly slowing
his pace, he climbed the huge Ares Hollingdale statue
towards the wall of steel and glass above.

“What’s on the other side of that glass?” Mitchell
yelled.

“You have to clear the area!” the policeman
repeated.

Mitchell gritted his teeth and pulled up the sleeve of
his coat. On the underside of his wrist was a small tattoo,
still raw where the skin was healing: a green stripe.

“I said, what’s on the other side of that glass?” he
shouted again.

The policeman’s demeanour was transformed. “It’s
just the roof of the next building and the ladder for the
clock,” he said quickly.

“So shoot him down!” Mitchell ordered. “If he
reaches the clock he’ll jump out of the service door and
get away.”

“Shoot him?” the policeman huffed. “In front of all
these people? People with camera phones? We’ll make
him a martyr. He’ll be more popular than ever.”

“Just do it!”

“Sorry, but—”

“But what?” Mitchell looked past the policeman to
see Viggo nearing the statue’s head.

“I’ll need clearance from the top,” said the officer.

“I
am
the top!” Mitchell roared, but the policeman
was already dipping his mouth to his walkie-talkie.

“It will take less than two minutes,” he said to
Mitchell. “We’ll shoot as soon as—”

“We don’t have two minutes.”

Mitchell raced to the statue and clambered up the
pedestal. In no time he reached Hollingdale’s waist, but
Viggo had already made the leap higher to the glass
underneath the clock. Then, in the corner of his eye,
Mitchell saw Helen, Felix and Georgie leaving the
station, unnoticed by the police.

Mitchell realised how clever Viggo was. By creating
a scene in the centre of the concourse he had pulled
the focus of the security cordon, allowing his friends to
slip away.
They can wait
, Mitchell reminded himself.

Viggo is the target
.
Now finish the job
. The desire felt
like an overwhelming thirst.

Mitchell’s fingers dug into every fold of bronze, his
limbs clambering up with a regular and rapid beat. At
the top he stood on Hollingdale’s head. He could hear
the shouts and gasps from the crowd below, but didn’t
hesitate. He leapt up and caught the first steel strut in
his fingers, then pulled himself on to it.

Viggo was directly above him, climbing up the glass
panes towards the clock. Each pane was about thirty
centimetres high in a thin wooden frame. Mitchell could
climb this as easily as if it was a ladder.

Within seconds he could reach Viggo’s ankle, but the
man knew he was there. Viggo kicked out at Mitchell’s
grasp. Mitchell responded with a burst of speed. Viggo
was only centimetres from the bottom of the clock, but
Mitchell clambered up to be level with him and slammed
the base of his palm into Viggo’s face.

Viggo’s head rocked back. His cap tumbled down to
the crowd below and blood spurted from his nose,
spattering red on to the white and gold of the bottom
half of the clock face. He lost his footing and only held
on to the wooden frame with his fingertips. The back
of his head was exposed and easily within Mitchell’s
reach. It may as well have had a target sign painted
on it.
A single blow
, Mitchell told himself.
Complete
the mission. Finish him
.

He lifted his arm for the kill, but Viggo wasn’t giving
up. He kicked both legs up to the side, crunching his
knee into Mitchell’s solar plexus. Mitchell crumpled in
two. His fingers slipped. But his body responded with a
jump and he was able to grab hold of the decoration
round the bottom edge of the clock itself.

He was above his target now. And Viggo had swung
round with the impetus of his kick. He was only holding
on with one hand, his back to the glass, the front of his
body totally vulnerable. Mitchell hauled in a deep breath
and raised his right arm above his head.

“Right here, isn’t it?” said Viggo suddenly, pointing to
the base of his throat. His words seemed to echo
around the whole terminal hall. “That’s how we were
trained, isn’t it?”

Mitchell could feel the blood fizzing through his
fingertips. He clenched his hand, ready to chop, and
fixed his eyes on that square centimetre of flesh just
above Viggo’s collarbone. One strike and he could cut
off the oxygen to the brain.

“Come on,” Viggo taunted, pulling his shirt collar
down and thrusting out his chest to bring the target
closer to Mitchell. “Right here. End it.”

Mitchell’s eyes flickered up to Viggo’s face. What
was this man doing? Didn’t he want to survive?

“Without me the Government will go on forever,
won’t it?” Viggo hissed. “Long live Neo-democracy and
war whenever you feel like it.”

Mitchell stared into the man’s eyes. There was no
fear there. Mitchell had never seen such contained
passion – such calm fury.

“It won’t happen, Mitchell,” Viggo went on. “Not once
you’ve shown everybody down there what this
Government can do.”

Stop this
, Mitchell ordered himself.
Time to finish it
.
He could hear his brain telling him he may never have a
better opportunity. And yet it felt like there was
concrete running through his veins, slowing his
movements, fossilising his thoughts.

“Look down there,” Viggo whispered. “I fight for what
I believe and I’ll die for what I believe. But Britain doesn’t
need me to fight for them. After this, people will know
without me telling them. They’ll see for themselves.
They’ll fight for themselves.”

Mitchell tried to shut out the words. He didn’t care
about the politics. This was his job, his mission. NJ7
was his life. Without it, there was nothing for him. This
was what he believed in.

At last he forced a burst of heat into his muscles. A
spark flew up his arm then exploded into pure strength.

“People know nothing,” Mitchell grunted. His arm
whipped downwards. Viggo closed his eyes.

But in that hundredth of a second, the crack of a rifle
echoed through the terminal. A bullet flew past
Mitchell’s ear. His hand veered off target.
Miss Bennett
sent clearance to shoot!
he thought.

CRASH!

The glass shattered. Mitchell saw Viggo fall
backwards through a shower of glass, wooden splinters
and blood. The man’s eyes were still closed. After a
split-second he disappeared into the darkness.

Mitchell’s footholds in the wooden frame had
collapsed. He dangled from the clock with one arm and
looked below him. On one side, the station concourse
was in chaos. People were bleeding from the dropping
glass, others were screaming, running, or just gaping
up at Mitchell, while the police tried to control them all.

On the other side, Mitchell could see the roof of the
next building.

“Where are you?” he whispered.

But there was no movement. All he could make out
were shadows.

“You want them to see you?” Marla was shocked at
what Jimmy had said.

They soared higher, darting through the clouds until
they were level with the cockpits of the two fighter jets.

“Take the flightstick,” Jimmy ordered.

“What?” Marla gasped.

“Just hold it steady. That’s all you need to do.” He
took off his helmet and scooped the actinium into it.

“What are you doing?” Marla shouted, grabbing the
flightstick in panic. “I think they are going to shoot again.
The lights are—”

Jimmy was already climbing out on to the arm that
held the missile launch mechanism. There was one on
either side of the chopper, sticking out like stubby
wings. He had to force himself to hold the strap of his
helmet in his teeth so his arms were free to grip the
chopper. He could feel the strain in his shoulders, the
muscles gripping the bones in their sockets. He
mentally counted off every injury he’d suffered, each one
weakening his system a little more, making it more likely
he’d lose his grip and plunge to his death.

His helmet dangled against his chest. In the dim
light, with the spray and the fog, the actinium stones
glowed like beacons. He thought he could feel them
burning through the metal, through his shirt and into
his skin.
Forget that
, he told himself. It couldn’t harm
him any more than it already had. But it could help him
get to Britain.

When he reached the rocket, he cracked open the
casing, working with one hand while he gripped the
chopper with the other. Inside, the rocket was a jumble
of wires and metal slots, but Jimmy’s mind highlighted
certain parts, picking out the routes of the circuits and
the details of its workings. The wires were reduced to
the simplicity of a fast-food menu.

Jimmy unclipped the explosive charge – a red and blue
cylinder that resembled a large battery – and dropped it
into the fog. Then, still with one hand, he carefully poured
the stones into the empty space in the rocket.

When he had finished, he swung back to the side of
the chopper. Even at this altitude he could taste the sea
salt in the air. He pulled himself into the cockpit,
dropping the helmet at his feet, and took back the
controls of the helicopter.

“Do you think he saw me?” he panted, peering
through the fog towards one of the fighter jets.

“I think you are crazy,” Marla shouted back. “I think we
are trapped, we have no defence and they will shoot us.”

Jimmy looked from Marla to the plane and back
again. The warning lights from the control panel flashed
against Marla’s skin, red on black. The chopper was
locked in as a target.

“So why haven’t they fired yet?” Jimmy asked quietly.
“What are they waiting for?”

High up in the control tower of Sauvage Military
Airbase, Uno Stovorsky clutched a mug of coffee. His
hands were still shaking. In front of him a team of three
flight controllers monitored the progress of events over
the Channel.

But Stovorsky’s thoughts were far away. He stared
blankly at the wall above the computers in front of him
and simply nodded when the engineers updated him.
A portrait of an elderly man looked down at him – Dr
Memnon Sauvage. The man this airbase was named
after. A Secret Service hero who had died protecting
French secrets. The man who had designed Zafi.

Stovorsky’s head throbbed and his eyes were heavy
with tiredness. All he could hear was his own voice
buzzing round his head. Jimmy’s mother, sister and
best friend… He’d given the order to kill.

Two children
, he told himself. He took a sip of
coffee, but couldn’t wash away the bitterness rising in
his throat.
He made me do it
, he thought, but it didn’t
alleviate the stabbing pain in his skull. He couldn’t take
his eyes off Dr Sauvage’s stern expression bearing
down on him. “It was the only way!” he shouted
in English.