Authors: Mark Clark
Behind the eight combatants, with an enormous ‘whoosh’, the metal slats sprang skyward and the maze was up. The crowd exploded. All eight men were taken to separate places around the arena on the outside of the maze to await the starting siren.
There was great anticipation in the crowd and a silence fell upon it. But the tension was released into laughter when ‘The British Lion’, departing for northern waters, sounded her horn in the harbour and some in the audience thought that the bout had begun. After this prematurity and much laughter from the crowd, the siren did eventually sound and The Games began in earnest.
Immediately the five 300s entered their nearest entrance to the maze. Each, with the mind of a genius, realised that they must first kill off the serious competition before they bothered mopping up the criminals Viles had thrown in as, as they saw it, a kind of carnival curiosity. No, first they must survive the onslaught of the other 300s. Then they could worry about the other three also-rans. Inside each of their minds was a blueprint of the labyrinth and, as each saw an overview of the map in their mind, each played out the various routes that the others might take and assessed the ramifications of those moves. Like five master chess players, the five armed men moved noiselessly within the metal walls, each watching the configuration of the maze from a bird’s eye point of view within the fluid compartments of their lock-step minds.
Meanwhile, Leslie, Damien and Edgar, who had watched the 300s enter the maze, chose not to enter it. They ran around its outside and met up on the far side of it to Viles. They stood as a group, each with his gun pointed outward. Slowly, under Leslie’s guidance, they were shuffling towards the area of the fence where he had seen the breach. This small knot of men shuffling along the outside of the maze and its contrast to the stealthy movement and counter movement of the five men within it began to cause a rumble in the crowd.
Some members of the audience saw the farce in it and pointed this out to others. Many crowd members began to titter and even to laugh openly at the contradiction between the behaviour of the geniuses in the maze and that of the lower I.Q.s on the outside. This sheer juxtaposition was funny enough, but when the red and blue 300s managed to find themselves face to face within the maze and managed to blow each other’s heads off, the contrast became apparent to all, and hoots of laughter permeated the arena.
‘It seems that your idiots are smarter than your geniuses,’ the interpreter translated for Benny Jong Il.
Viles nodded and smiled at Jong Il but he was highly embarrassed, a fact that the Korean dictator well realised – and he was dining heartily on schadenfreude.
‘What’s happening?’ asked Christopher of his mother, but Elizabeth was hardly there. Gone were the flashing eyes, gone was the passionate potentate. She was a shell; an ornament; an empty thing; a child.
Leslie, Damien and Edgar reached the small breach in the fence. Damien had a quick look, so as not to make their intentions too obvious.
‘There’s a small gap we can fit through one at a time and there’s a passageway behind it leading through the grandstand, but there’s a problem.’
‘What’s that?’ asked Leslie who had not taken his eyes from the maze in front of him for fear of the sudden appearance of a 300.
‘There are about seven or eight guards on either side of it.’
‘It figures,’ said Edgar. He was breathing heavily and sweating profusely. Damien steadied him by the arm.
‘It’s okay, boy. We’ll get you through. Les, how many bullets do we have?’
‘These are six shooters, I think.’
‘We have eighteen bullets,’ said Damien.
The three men looked one to the other.
‘Better make ‘em count.’
Behind them, in the maze, a barrage of shots rang out and a high-pitched scream told that another 300 had been hit. This galvanised them into action.
The three men placed their hands together for luck. Their eyes met and they each tried to smile. They broke hands, left their little silent world, and turned towards the crowd. The noise was deafening. Some were cheering the winning combatants in the maze; others had grown tired of the trio’s lack of participation and were beginning to jeer loudly; and yet others still found the whole thing hilarious and were belly-laughing like hyenas.
Into the melee the three men plunged; Damien first, then Leslie, then Edgar, each with their guns ablaze and levelled directly at the guards. Five guards, who had been on crowd control and so had been facing the wrong direction, were killed outright by the hail of bullets. Another two saw their comrades fall, turned and tried to return fire. But they had been caught by surprise and both were felled. Two bystanders were also hit and Edgar felt some compassion for them as he sped past, but his compassion was swamped by his adrenaline and his great desire to live.
Through the dark passageway they sped to be spat out onto the grass hill beyond. Downhill they ran, their hearts pounding in their necks, down towards the harbour.
It took a moment for Viles to realise what had happened. At first he, like everyone else on the far side of the arena, thought that the barrage of bullets was coming from inside the maze. When he realised the truth, he was livid. He stood and commanded all guards to: ‘Kill them! No quarter!’ And two score of men left their posts and disappeared into the night.
The moon was not yet up and the going was tough for the three fugitives. Their knees were grazed and their bodies bruised by the time they approached the water.
‘There it is!’ Leslie whispered loudly. ‘Quick!’
Down towards the wharf they ran at breakneck speed and onto the old wooden boards that creaked and boomed with their arrival.
But there was no boat.
‘Shit!’ Damien cursed.
‘There’s one out there,’ said Edgar, pointing out across the dark water.
The sound of men became audible. The guards were hurrying down the hill just as the fugitives had and, just like the fugitives, they had no lanterns. So there were yells and yelps as some took chunks out of themselves on the rough sandstone, under the moonless night.
‘Down here!’ said Leslie. He jumped off the wharf and into the harbour. Damien and Leslie followed.
The water was cold, in spite of summer, and the salt ate into their abrasions. Leslie was no great swimmer and the water invaded his nose as he hit the water and he tasted the sea, via his nostrils.
The three men huddled under the wharf, clutching the pylons. The grim sea water lapped against them. Soon they heard the rumble of boots on suspended boards. They held their breath and listened as one of the guards said, ‘Take your men down the southern trail. I’ll take mine and head north.’ Then they heard the scuttle of boots on boards again, then the sound of disappearing voices and then silence.
‘Look,’ whispered Edgar. ‘That boat. It’s coming closer.’
‘It’s a ferry, thank God,’ Damien replied.
‘Should we swim for it?’ asked Edgar.
‘No need,’ replied Leslie. ‘It’ll be here within a couple of minutes. We’ll wait for it and commandeer it when it gets here.’
The men resurfaced and clamoured into the night-time silence of the shed above. They dried themselves as best they could. Edgar kept look out, but there was no movement north or south and no one was coming down the hill.
The ferry was about to dock and the captain was throwing out the painters when they heard a cough come from the darkness behind them. They turned to see a solitary guard with his rifle trained upon them. They raised their hands.
‘Step over here, into the light,’ he commanded. He was a large man with big features and a gruff voice. The men obeyed without protest.
‘Let us go,’ said Edgar. ‘No one will ever know. Please.’
The guard laughed sardonically. ‘Now why would I do that?’ he asked. ‘I’ll get two I.Q. points apiece for you runaways and an extra five if I bring you in alive. I’m not allowed to use ‘em, but I sure as hell can sell ‘em.’
The captain of the ferry had tied her off by this time. He was lonely and pleased for any company. He could just make out the four men in the darkness of the shed. ‘Probably get a few strays coming down the hill from the show tonight!’ he yelled out in welcome. ‘Don’t know why they’d bother, to be honest. It’s a dark old road. Still I s’ppose some youngens’ll try.’ He laughed to himself with the thought. He moved towards them. ‘Any sane person’d go by electric bus.’
‘Go away, old man,’ commanded the guard.
‘There’s no need to be rude, young fella,’ replied the old salt, still approaching.
‘I said go away!’ blurted the guard. As he shouted this, he kicked the poor man viciously in the leg. The old man yelped in pain and fell backwards clutching his shin. But the effort had thrown the guard momentarily off balance. In an instant, Damien grabbed for his gun. He was soon joined in the scuffle by Leslie and Edgar. In amongst the thrashing and the bashing, somehow the gun went off. The thrashing stopped. Damien fell off the pack.
The guard rose to his feet, holding the gun towards Leslie and Edgar, ‘Now get up,’ he ordered, ‘or I’ll kill you both!’
Edgar got up, but Leslie knelt above Damien. He turned him over. His grey robes were sodden with red and the stain was growing like a dry river bed after the first rains.
‘Damien,’ Leslie cried.
‘I said get up!’ shouted the guard.
But Damien was gone. His eyes were glazed and dead and the blood was pouring out of him.
‘I won’t tell you again!’ warned the guard.
The guard could not see Leslie’s face but a look of pure fury had wiped all other emotion from it and a maelstrom of hatred whirled within each of his eyes. Without a word he found the gun tucked into his trouser sash, ripped it from its hiding place, turned and fell and fired one single shot right into the middle of the guard’s forehead. The guard stood for a second, as if unable to believe it, then he crashed, first onto his knees and then onto his face and then, in slow motion, onto the splintery boards.
‘We’ve got to go,’ Leslie said urgently. ‘Everybody within ten kilometres heard that shot. Quick grab his gun.’
‘But, Damien?’ asked Edgar.
‘He’s dead, Edgar. Damien’s dead.’
Edgar looked down in disbelief.
‘And you’re going to take us out. Now!’ Leslie ordered the ferryman.
‘Alright. Alright. I’ll take you. I’ll take you. Hold your horses,’ muttered the ferryman. He looked down at Damien, ‘Sorry about your friend,’ he said, then as he passed the fallen guard he spat, ‘You can go to hell,’ he muttered, rubbing his shin and making his way awkwardly towards his vessel.
As they cast off, Leslie and Edgar heard the approach of men coming from south and north.
The engines started up and the ferry pulled away. It was disappearing into the gloom by the time the guards reached the wharf. They fired several shots but it soon became obvious that the ferry was too far out to stop.
‘Never mind,’ said one captain of the guards, ‘we’ll be waiting for them on the other side.’
Viles, who had finally divested himself of that self-righteous, gloating Benny Jong Il, who apparently, according to him, never had escapees in his country, was in no great mood by the time this information was relayed to him.
‘What!’ he screamed at the captain of the guard.
‘It’s alright, President Viles,’ the man assured him, ‘we’ve already got people waiting for them on the other side of the harbour. They can’t possibly get away. There’s nowhere else to go.’
Viles thought about that for a moment. He turned and looked out across the harbour. The watery world was in darkness, but for ‘The British Lion’ who had finally made her way out towards the heads. Her lights dominated the scene.
A phone call came. Viles took it. ‘Yes.’ He paused and listened. ‘What do you mean they’re not on board?’ He listened again. ‘Well check again. Check the hold. Check the . . .’ Viles stopped. He turned savagely around, and stared back out of the window and across the harbour towards the great British container ship carving her way towards the open sea.
‘Damn you to hell!’ he blurted. He disconnected the phone and dialled another number. ‘South Head!’ he barked. ‘Bring down the Keeper of the Breach! Now!’
Viles threw the phone at the wall and stood glaring out of his window.
Above the heads, the suspended, rolled metal began to unravel like a creaky old giant waking after a long sleep. Downward she unfurled, screeching all the long way – a roller door of massive proportions.
Beneath her ‘The British Lion’ was already passing into open sea. Looking up from the aft and resting against a huge container were Leslie and Edgar. They watched as the great metal barrier unfurled to completely encase the harbour and cut it off from the outside world. By that time the lights of Corporate City were mere froth upon the distant horizon.
‘Do you think they’ll welcome us in London?’ asked Edgar.
‘I hope so, Edgar. I hope so. But at least for the minute we’re free from the curse of Viles.’
‘We’ll beat him one day,’ said Edgar.
‘Maybe,’ replied Leslie, ‘but maybe not in our lifetime. Come on. Let’s get something to eat.’
Leslie placed his arm in friendship around Edgar’s shoulder and the two men left the stern together.
*
ANGLE ON to the container upon which they have been leaning.
It reads: I.Q. Transference Unit – Westminster - London.
Thank you for reading The Book of Levi.
If you enjoyed this book, the story will continue with:
Coming 2016
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www.markclark.com.au
Cheers,
Mark