Endgame (Agent 21) (13 page)

It was obvious to Ricky, however, that with each passing mile, they were heading further from civilization.

‘Stop the car,’ Zak said suddenly.

The trace of a smile passed the driver’s lips. ‘Well, you know,’ he said, ‘I might just do that.’ He didn’t stop immediately, but continued for another twenty metres before pulling over on the side of the road and killing the engine.

There was a deep, muffled silence. The driver looked straight ahead. Ricky could hear the tense, shallow breathing of his companions.

‘We’re paying you,’ Ricky said. ‘Now you need to keep your end of the bargain.’

That smile again. There was no humour in it. ‘Well, here’s the thing, kiddo,’ the driver said, still staring straight through the window at the blizzard outside. ‘Three things, actually. First thing: I’m pretty sure there’s a whole lot more of the green stuff where that came from. Second thing: storm like this, out in the wilds like we are, you ain’t getting no place without my help. And third thing: I don’t know why you’re on the run from the police, but I’m guessing you probably don’t want to make a big deal about someone like me helping themselves to your riches. Am I right, or am I right?’

– Maybe we can overpower him. Take control of the vehicle, use it to get back to the main road.

It looked to Ricky as though Zak was having the same thoughts. Malcolm, on the other hand, had gone paler than usual and was sinking back into his seat.

‘Oh,’ the driver said. ‘There was one other thing I forgot.’ He turned to look over his shoulder. ‘This part of the world, most everyone carries a gun.’

He raised his right arm. Ricky’s skin prickled as he saw the driver firmly holding a grey handgun.

‘Not a big deal, to get the better of three ordinary kids. And you might as well know that if I bury you in the snow, nobody’s going to find you till next spring. So let’s not make this any longer or uglier than it has to be.’ The driver pointed the gun from Ricky to Zak – he had obviously identified the two of them as his greatest threats. ‘Collect your bags, get out of the vehicle and keep your hands where I can see them. Try to run and I’ll pick you off like a goddamn grizzly.’

‘Look, mate,’ Zak said, ‘you’ve got the wrong idea. We don’t want any trouble. We’re just here to visit our grandparents—’

‘
Get out of the car!
’

A tense silence.

‘Do it,’ Zak said.

Ricky slid the door open. The three of them climbed out. Ricky instantly felt himself sink into about thirty centimetres of snow.

‘Move round to the front of the car. And hands where I can see them!’ the driver barked. Ricky, Zak and Malcolm all raised their hands above their heads as they skirted round the vehicle – Malcolm standing about three metres away from the engine, then Zak, then Ricky. The swirling snow bit into their faces, and within seconds, Ricky could feel his body temperature plummet. He watched the figure of the driver shuffle round the front of the people carrier, then approach them, his weapon pointing directly at their chests. He stopped just half a metre in front of Zak. ‘OK, kids,’ he said. ‘Open up your packs. Let’s see what you’ve got.’

None of them moved.

‘I said, open up your packs!’

‘Sure,’ Zak said quietly. ‘But before we do,
I’ve
got three things to tell
you
.’

The driver looked almost amused as snow started settling on his clothes. ‘Oh yeah?’ he said. ‘Well, make it quick, son. I’m getting cold.’

– Zak’s distracting him. He’s getting him to lower his guard. You understand that, right?

– Right.

‘First thing: we’ve got nothing to give you.’

‘We’ll see about that, kid, just as soon as you’ve emptied out your pack.’

‘Second thing: I’ve got a feeling
you
don’t want to talk to the police any more than we do.’

The driver sneered. ‘And the third thing?’

‘Oh yeah,’ said Zak. ‘The third thing. That’s the most important.’ He leaned forward slightly, and as he did so, the driver mirrored his action. ‘The third thing is that we’re
not
ordinary kids . . .’

– NOW!

Ricky didn’t have to be told. His right arm shot out as a look of puzzlement crossed the driver’s face, cracking against the man’s gun wrist. A fraction of a second later, Zak had grabbed the gun, pointed it over his left shoulder and slammed his heel straight into the pit of the driver’s stomach.

The driver doubled over, spluttering and cursing badly. He still had his hands wrapped round the gun, but as Zak held his arm, he wasn’t in control of its direction. There was a sudden crack as the gun went off – it was surprisingly loud and sent such a shock through Ricky’s body that for a moment he thought he’d been hit – but then there was the sound of glass shattering. A round had slammed into the windscreen, and the glass had burst inward.

Zak and the driver were struggling, their feet sliding over the icy road. As they slipped towards the middle of the road, a second round exploded from the gun. It slammed into the side of the car, and petrol started glugging out. Ricky jumped forward to help Zak. He wrapped his arm around the driver’s neck and squeezed hard, as Zak wrenched the firearm from his fist then aimed a solid kick at the man’s ankles. Disarmed, he collapsed to the ground.

Zak was holding the gun with two hands. He was aiming it at the driver and had a fierce look in his eyes. Ricky held his breath. He found himself remembering Zak’s words:
I know how to kill but I’ve never done it . . . Most people have a rite of passage . . . Maybe this is ours . . .

Surely Zak wasn’t going to shoot this guy in cold blood.

Snow swirled around them. The driver looked up at Zak, terrified.

Zak lowered the gun. Without even looking at it, he removed the magazine and chucked the remaining rounds out of sight into the distance, where they would sink into the snow. The driver scrambled to his feet. With a quick glance at his vehicle – which was obviously un-driveable – he scrambled back down the road. He disappeared into the gloom in the direction they had come from.

Silence. Malcolm was shivering by the side of the road. Zak stalked round the car, taking in the damage, the fire still burning in his eyes. Ricky stood still, his heart pumping, peering into the darkness. ‘What do we do?’ he asked tensely.

Zak joined him. ‘We can’t stay here,’ he said. ‘That driver won’t leave his vehicle to get covered in snow. He’ll bring someone as quickly as possible to remove it. Maybe even the police. We need to get away from here.’

‘We can’t use the road,’ Ricky said. ‘Not if people are out looking for us. It means going cross-country.’

Zak frowned for a moment and looked up. Ricky realized he was trying to see the stars, to help him navigate. But there was nothing visible except the thick, swirling snowflakes. Going cross-country was not an attractive option. Especially as they now only had forty-seven hours until the deadline.

‘I think this road runs east–west,’ Ricky said. ‘We need to get back to the city. That’s the only place we’ve got a chance of getting transport to the Bering Straits. Anchorage is to the north-west. That way.’ He pointed in what he thought was a north-westerly direction. It looked no different to any other direction.

‘Agreed,’ Zak said. He peered into the icy darkness, then gave Malcolm – who was still shivering by the side of the road – a slightly worried look. ‘It could be slow going, and dangerous in the snow. We need to be prepared.’ He looked over at the car, then back at Ricky. ‘Help me,’ he said.

Cruz Martinez stood over his captives. They were lying on the floor, unconscious, their hands still tied behind their backs, their ankles bound. Their breath formed clouds of condensation, but their breathing was shallow and the clouds were small. The gashes Cruz had inflicted on their faces had stopped bleeding, but now they were white and puffy. If anything, they looked more alarming.

Cruz was holding a handgun. He walked up to his prisoners and placed the gun less than a metre from the woman’s head, with the barrel pointing down to the floor. He fired. The retort of the weapon was deafeningly loud. The round it fired shot a crack in the concrete floor of the hangar. The prisoners’ eyes immediately opened, and their bodies shuddered as if they themselves had been shot. It was a brutal way to wake them. You could see the stress and terror in their faces. But that was exactly what Cruz had intended.

‘I thought you’d like to know,’ Cruz said, ‘that Agent 21 has landed in Anchorage.’

The woman’s eyes tightened. ‘How . . . do you know?’ she asked. It was clearly difficult for her to speak with her bleeding lip.

‘We have our contacts. The Alaskan police are in pursuit, but they seem to have lost him. You taught him well. Running away is clearly a speciality of his.’

The woman looked him in the eye. ‘You should . . . let us go,’ she said. ‘Better for you . . . long run.’

Cruz smiled. ‘I’m very touched that you’re so concerned for my welfare. No, I won’t be letting you go. I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of state he’s in, if he makes it this far alive. The Alaskan wilderness can be deadly at this time of year.’ He crouched down so that he was at eye level with the prisoners. ‘I almost forgot,’ he said. ‘Our sources tell me he’s not travelling alone. I did make it very clear to him what would happen to you if he failed to follow my instructions.’

The barrel of the gun was still warm. He placed it against the woman’s cheekbone. She inhaled sharply, but didn’t take her fierce eyes off him as his forefinger caressed the trigger.

Time stood still.

Then Cruz started to laugh, very quietly. ‘He’s got two little helpers,’ he whispered. ‘Kids. I don’t think we need to worry about them, do we? Three little kids for the Three Kings Day.’ He gave a hollow laugh.

The woman said nothing. But there was a strange expression on her face. It was almost like triumph. Cruz Martinez didn’t notice it. He lowered his gun, stood up and, still laughing softly, left the ice-cold hangar that he had converted into a prison.

The cold was biting and deep. They had only been standing still a couple of minutes, and already the heat of the fight had seeped out of Zak’s body. In its place, a profound and sinister chill. Before doing anything else, they needed to pull on the snow gear they’d bought at Heathrow.

As they stripped out of their ordinary clothes, Zak felt his body temperature plummet even further. All three of them scrambled into their cold weather gear. ‘Make sure you put on your base layer,’ Zak told the others. ‘It’ll wick the sweat away and stop the liquid freezing on your skin.’ He noticed how Malcolm’s thin body was juddering even more than his and Ricky’s, and had to help him get his fleece over his head. ‘You OK, buddy?’ he asked quietly. Malcolm didn’t reply.

‘What do we do with our old clothes?’ Ricky asked.

‘Dump them. We’re going to need the room in our rucksacks.’

Once they were fully dressed, Zak and Ricky got to work on the vehicle. There were precious resources here. It was worth risking a little time to gather them.

In the glove compartment, they found a metallic water canteen, a powerful torch and a sharp hunting knife. ‘Maybe we should fill the canteen with whatever fuel we can still get out of the tank,’ Ricky said. ‘We could use it if we need to make a fire to warm up.’

Zak shook his head. ‘We’ll need water,’ he said.

‘Mate,’ Ricky objected. ‘There’s snow all around. Can’t we just eat that? Get fluids that way?’

‘No way.’ Zak had been well drilled in cold weather survival by his Guardian Angels. ‘It can hurt your mouth and lips, and dehydrate you even further. Plus, if you’re already cold, eating snow will just make you colder. Better to melt it first.’ His forehead creased. ‘But you’re right, we might need to make a fire at some point.’ He slashed the driver’s seat with the hunting knife and started pulling out the spongy stuffing. ‘Soak that in petrol, then try and find a bag to seal it in. It’ll be good fire-starting material. But make sure you get any petrol off your skin. It has a lower melting point than water so can damage you if it freezes.’

While Ricky did as he was told, Zak cut into one of the tyres and started ripping off strips of rubber, which he knew would burn fast and easily. He stowed these strips in his pack. Malcolm watched, shivering as a layer of snow settled on his clothes. ‘You keeping warm, buddy?’ Zak asked him quietly.

‘No,’ Malcolm said. ‘And I’m not strong like you. I don’t think I’ll manage out there.’ He pointed vaguely into the snow-filled darkness.

‘You’ll be fine once you get moving.’ Zak tried to inject some fight into Malcolm. Continuing his search of the vehicle, he found the manual and stowed it with the rubber strips – the paper would also be good for fire-starting, and out here he reckoned they’d need all the help they could get. Opening up the bonnet, he considered removing the battery and taking that to create sparks, but figured it would just be too heavy. And anyway, he had pocketed the driver’s cigarette lighter. Instead, he settled for tearing an old rag he found in the back of the car and dipping it into the oil reservoir. The strips came out thick, greasy and stinking, so he found an empty pocket in his rucksack and carefully stowed them away.

He turned his attention to the vehicle’s wing mirror. It was solid and heavy, and would be difficult to get off. But Zak judged that it was worth it: the mirror could be used for signalling if they needed to attract someone’s attention. He used all his strength to wrench the mirror from the body of the car, then cut through the cables that attached it using their stolen hunting knife.

By the time Zak had removed the mirror, Ricky had found an old plastic bag in the back of the vehicle and stuffed it full of petrol-soaked seat-stuffing. Malcolm was still loitering by the car, looking helpless. Zak felt another twinge of doubt about the wisdom of having brought him, but then reminded himself that without Malcolm, they’d have been caught at Anchorage airport, or even stuck back in the UK.

‘Malcolm,’ he said, deciding that he needed a job to keep him active. ‘There are some rubber foot mats in the front and the back. Why don’t you roll them up and get them into your pack?’