Successio (23 page)

XXVII

Crawling around in a wood in an elite special forces’ backyard was not the safest thing I could think to do. But it was somewhere to start. I’d stepped off the bus at the entrance to a garden centre, two stops before the base gate. I wandered past the special offers, through the shrubs out to the trees section at the back where the delivery gate would be. Nobody hauled two-metre high trees in heavy containers further than they needed to.

I slipped behind the last row of conifers, picked the gate lock and exited on to a country road. After an intersection where the delivery trucks had to come, it narrowed and started climbing. A little over a kilometre further on, a wood came into view over the rise. Green stuff started to appear in the raised centre of the road which finished up at a farm gate. I hiked along field boundaries keeping a northwest direction, sometimes crouching, sometimes lucky to find some sheltering hedgerow, but always below the sight line.

A hundred metres from the edge of the wood, I hunkered down behind a hedgerow. If Nicola was there, she’d be watching. No way was I attempting anything until it was dark. I ate my sandwich, pulled my microfibre bag over me, covered it with dead leaves and recently-live green twigs and grabbed a few hours’ sleep, knife in my hand.

*

Exactly four hours later, I woke. Completely. I couldn’t hear any wildlife except a few birds. Moving my hand at an excruciatingly slow pace, I fished out my pocketscope and swept around for body heat. Two adult signatures and a small animal blazed out in red.

They kept many of their training areas open-access here, except during exercises. Michael had told me some walkers even tried to continue in the face of live fire. Asserting their rights, they said. How dumb was that?

I stayed where I was until I saw an older couple emerge from under the tree canopy. A pointy-eared, long-haired dog trotted near the ground in front of them. It stopped, sniffed and cocked an ear; far better detector than the best Brown Industries scanner. The man bent and attached a leash to the dog’s collar and they walked away, following a trail down the opposite hill. The dog tried to pull back but was dragged away by the impatient owner anxious to get home before dusk turned to night.

I folded my microfibre bag and stuffed it back in my field bag, swapping it for a bottle of water. While I swallowed, I scanned for electronic or thermal detection fields. The fibreglass and aluminium linings to my clothes and face scarf would blur my signature on good equipment, I doubted Nicola had anything that efficient – it was too expensive. No, it would be the old-fashioned way.

Thankful for a sickle moon, I crawled forward into the chilly night. My coat was covered with tiny water beads from ground dew as I brushed over it. At the edge of the wood, I crouched and paused for a few minutes, searching away from the trail. Nothing. Just standard nocturnal fluttering of birds and scurrying of small mammals. I headed for the rise and stopped for frequent sampling with my pocketscope. Nothing, just an even blue-green image. I made my way up towards the highpoint – an Iron Age hill fort, the map said. Ten metres from the top, I lay in the shelter of undergrowth. I waited twenty long minutes. I stowed my field bag inside a group of hawthorn bushes and crept forward, my carbon fibre knife in hand.

In a dense thicket, I found a camp; two DPM groundsheets, one slung over a rope and each side stretched taut at an angle to deflect rain and the other on the ground, edges tied up to form a bundle. Inside were a sleeping bag, cutlery, mess tins, bottles of water and a khaki backpack with basic field supplies. And a gold
solidus
with Silvia’s portrait, a thin ribbon tied through a hole in the top of the coin.

Batting away satisfaction, I started looking around for a good ambush point. Once I had her, I could hold her in this isolated spot and get an evacuation team here in hours. I didn’t think this was one time Daniel would go stiff-rumped on me. The Brits wouldn’t even know I’d been here.

*

I did a regular scan every fifteen minutes, but it was getting a little boring. I’d been here five hours and she hadn’t shown up. Had she found any trace of me? Maybe she was out getting supplies. She couldn’t forage during the day – the risk of running across somebody who knew her would be too great. I stretched my arms and legs where I lay. The last thing I needed was slow reaction from stiff muscles.

Leaves swishing apart and rebounding. Too much movement for a small animal. Human. I tensed. The adrenaline sparked and started flowing. I moved quickly into a crouch, knife in my right hand, scope held to my eye in my left. More movement to my left. Hades! There were more of them. Six, seven. Maybe eight. Too late to run. I shrank back, flattening myself against a tree trunk and froze. It had to be a night exercise. It could be why Nicola wasn’t here. But how had she known?

Before I could work out any answer, something hit my head, pain exploded. I dropped to the ground and went out.

*

The jolting woke me. I was lying on a ridged metallic floor, my hands tied behind me. I was bouncing along in a vehicle without any suspension. A shortbase jeep. It smelled of gasoline and human sweat. My head hurt like the Furies having a bad day. When I tried moving, everything swam in front of me. I closed my eyes and made the effort to breathe deeply and slowly. I forced myself to visualise blood flowing around my veins and arteries healing my wounds, open flesh closing, endorphins being released.

Ten minutes later, the vehicle stopped. The driver’s door swung open. The whole vehicle shuddered as it was slammed shut. Boots on concrete, then the tailgate was released, the side chain clanking. The beam from a flashlight blinded me. Hands grabbed my ankles and yanked me out into a heap on the ground. Catching my breath, I struggled up on to my knees. A figure with a balaclava mask over his face thrust his arm out, hauled me to my feet. A second, shorter figure jabbed a barrel into the back of my neck. The first one dragged me towards one of the buildings on the edge of the parking lot and shoved me through the door.

A twin neon light hung in the roof space from a crosswork grid. Benches ran around three sides of the room with tools scattered over them. Some kind of workshop. I flexed the balls of my feet, looking for a pathway out of here. I made to pull away, but the figure squeezed his grip on my radial. It was excruciating.

‘A mistake. Please, let me explain,’ I didn’t have to fake the shaking in my voice.

He swung his arm back in a full arc. I tried to duck, but he still managed to punch me in the mouth. I staggered back. As the blood rushed back in, pain throbbed through my cheek. Liquid from my nose on my upper lip. Salty, iron. Blood.

The shorter one stood a metre away training his Glock on my head. The taller one thrust me down on a chair, looped a second cable tie between my wrists to the back of the chair. He secured my ankles to the chair legs with more cable ties and stood back like he was satisfied with his day’s work.

‘Water,’ I croaked. ‘Please.’

A bucket of water hit me full in the face, but at least it cleared my head. Did they think I was part of the ‘enemy’ for the exercise? These guys played hard, but this was beyond that. And why only two of them?

The shorter one advanced on me. Through the balaclava eye holes, I saw quarter moons of light reflected by the copper tones in the hazel eyes.

Shit
.

‘Hello, Nicola,’ I said, who’s the boyfriend this time?’

Maybe it was stupid to annoy her but it was satisfying.

She seized her balaclava in a claw-like movement, dragged it off her head and threw it on the ground. Her face was red from temper. She kicked me several times in the same place on my shin. My leg starred with pain and I felt something give. She’d broken the bone. I struggled to heave air back into my lungs, water welling in my eyes. I refused to scream, but bit my damaged lip.

‘Later. You can have your fun later, Nic.’

I knew that voice. Where from? Native English, military from his walk. As he pulled his own balaclava off, I recognised Lieutenant Wilson from that joint exercise an eon ago.

Crap
.

‘Well, Major, my turn.’

I didn’t update him on my career development.

He brandished a syringe, upended a bottle of transparent liquid, punctured the rubber seal with the syringe needle and slowly drew the liquid into the reservoir.

I coughed and swallowed more of my blood.

‘What’s that?’ I whispered.

‘Something, as you told me several months ago, “that‘ll have you chirruping like a mongoose on holiday”.’

He yanked my sleeve up, stabbed the syringe into the crook of my elbow and rammed the plunger deep into my flesh. I gasped at the pain. Vindictive son of a bitch.

Faenia’s chemical bombs would protect me for a while from whatever it was, only up to a max of forty-eight hours. And I’d forgotten to take a booster this morning.

‘Where are the rest of your team?’ Nicola shouted in my face.

I didn’t answer.

I collapsed as she jabbed her elbow in my stomach. Sour fumes throbbed their way up my gullet. The rest of my sandwich followed.

*

I woke up choking on a mix of blood and saliva and the smell of machine oil.

Light was creeping in at the strip windows running along the top of the walls. How long had I been here? I was woozy from the drug they’d pumped into me. Juno, I was stiff. And sore. My face throbbed and my leg pulsed with pain.

I craned my head around as far as I could. Nobody. No sound except a machine hum like a refrigerator from the far wall. I risked closing my eyes for a few moments and took some deep breaths. Even that tiny movement made my face ache.

Only years of training had made me keep my tongue behind the shelter of my teeth. I ran it around the inside of my mouth and found a loose tooth and a pool of blood. I bent my head over and let it dribble out, taking the tooth with it. Swallowing blood just made you throw up more. The hurt from my stomach was painful enough; if I threw up again my middle would implode from agony.

I scanned around. The workbench was three, max four metres away; it could have been four kilometres. But if I did nothing, I’d be killed like a stuck pig.

I twisted my good foot left and right. The cable ties were tight on my ankles, but I could place my feet on the ground. But one leg was going to have to do the work of two. I leaned forward, causing the back chair feet to move millimetres off the ground. Swinging to my right to gain momentum, I forced the right chair leg another millimetre up and pivoted on my left foot nearly 180 degrees to my left. I gasped at the pain that shot through my abs. I reckoned ten more to get to the bench. And next time I’d have to swing on the other leg.

The sweat running into my eyes was nearly blinding me and I was sucking in lung-wrenching breaths as I prepared for the last turn. I had just sixty centimetres to navigate to reach the bench. Maybe I would make it out of here.

Then I heard voices outside the door, one higher than the other. The inside handle travelled down a couple of centimetres. I was overcome by a wave of bitterness at the wasted effort of the past fifteen minutes. I had so nearly got there. And they’d start breaking more of me until there was nothing left.

Holding my breath, I stared at the handle. I could hardly believe it as it travelled back to horizontal. The voices disappeared abruptly. I released my breath and burst into silent tears of relief.

I spotted a hand file and manoeuvred it with my bruised mouth into a vertical bench clamp and pushed the lever round with my shoulder, tightening it with painful slowness. Ignoring the ache of stretching I moved my wrists up and down against the file edge. After a few minutes my arms ached with the agony, but when the ties snapped, the release of tension in my shoulders was blissful. I eased the file out of the clamp and freed my legs. I rubbed my good ankle and wrists to get blood flowing again. The adrenaline was pulsing already.

With shaking hands, I took off my jacket, pulled off my tee and ripped it along the underarm seams to make a bandage to strap my leg up. I tied it so tight my leg went numb temporarily. I only hoped I hadn’t damaged it further. I stood and tried putting some body weight on it. Not one of my best ideas. But I had no choice.

At the door, I huddled against the wall. Grasping the handle I opened the door half a centimetre. A short wheelbase outside but no people, no boots on gravel. Nothing.

I hobbled out and dragged myself along the edge of the metal-clad building. At the corner I stopped and waited for the pain in my damned leg to subside. I eased my face around the edge and jerked back as I saw a soldier cross to the brick building opposite. I was on the base but I didn’t have a clue where. The silver and white comms dishes and antennas on the headquarter building stood out against the night sky, so I staggered from shadow to shadow in that direction. I didn’t know how long I had before they discovered I’d escaped. But I knew I had to get medical help soon or I was going to pass out again.

*

All I had to do was cross an open grass area about twenty metres deep. I leaned against the cold brick, resting for a few breaths. No way could I let myself slither down the wall and sit. I would never get up again.

Like some hunted animal, I didn’t want to leave the protection of the shadows. But I had no option. When I fell to my knees after a few metres, I didn’t have enough strength to push through the pain and stand up, so I crawled, dragging myself along the ground with my elbows. I was halfway across when somebody slammed into me, crushing me into a heap of agony.

Wilson. In the moonlight, his face was livid, monstrous even.

‘No!’ I shrieked. I was pinioned like a beetle on its back, too weak to do anything except protect my face. I balled one fist and tried to swing my arm, but I was losing the struggle as he pinned me down.

I screamed, half-choking on the blood that had started to flow again in my mouth. I spat it out into his eyes. He jerked back, then brought his arm up to smash his hand into my face again.