One of Our Thursdays Is Missing (27 page)

There was the sound of safety catches being released from the men behind me. They were quite obviously armed and, from the sound of it, heavily.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t do any sort of deal, Miss Next,” said Potblack with renewed confidence. “Perhaps you would like to reconsider. My men will finish you before you get to three, and you’ll end up with all the others—six feet under the Savernake Forest, a feast for the worms. I apologize if I have been impolite, but as you understand, a lot rides on a lifted prohibition, and I speak not only for myself but for many cheese suppliers up and down the country. We can make this work to the best advantage for all of us, I’m sure—and perhaps even offer up some sort of compensatory payment.”

“Two.”

“You really don’t understand, do you?” said the Stiltonista in a voice that now carried an echo of uncertainty. “It doesn’t have to end for you like this.”

I didn’t have a plan of action, but that didn’t seem to be a problem, for the plan of action had
me
, and before I knew what had happened, I had the barrel of my pistol pressed hard against the Stiltonista’s throat and the man with the spade was flat on his back unconscious. The goon next to me had managed to get his hand to the butt of his automatic, but no farther. The rest were just blinking stupidly. Oddly, I didn’t feel nervous in the least. It felt like I was someone else. Someone else
inside
me.

“You see what happens when you’re impolite?” I said. “And don’t struggle. This an armor piercer. Once it’s gone through, only Exxon will be able to retrieve it—or you.”

He stopped struggling.

“Tell them to drop their weapons.”

He did, and they did.

“Right,” I said, unsure what to do next. “This is the plan. . . . ”

If there was a plan, I never found out what it was, for a voice rang out from one corner of the warehouse.

“
Armed police!
You are surrounded. Do
exactly
as we tell you. Carefully and slowly, put your hands behind your heads.”

The Stiltonista’s goons did as the voice asked and seemed to know the drill, as they also lay flat on their faces without being asked.

“And you, Next.”

I set my pistol on the floor, kicked it away and then obediently placed my hands on the back of my head and lay on the ground quite close to where Potblack now lay.

“I’ll get you for this if it’s the last thing I do, Next.”

He said it without looking at me, his voice a low growl.

“Really?” I replied evenly. “Try to get me or my family and I’ll happily ensure that it is.”

He grumbled and faced the other way.

I heard the patter of feet, and within a few seconds I felt my arms pulled behind me and bound with a plastic tie. They weren’t rough, though—they were almost gentle.

“Got a weapon here,” said a voice, quickly followed by, “Got several weapons here.”

“Thursday, Thursday,” came the voice that had been behind the bullhorn. It was deep and earthy and was exactly how I expected Spike to sound. He was one of Thursday’s SpecOps pals—someone who had been more than happy to feature in the series. It was the only recognition he’d ever got.

“Spike?”

“Hello, old friend,” he said. “What have you got for us?”

“Keitel Potblack, head of the Swindon Stiltonistas,” I said,

“threatened to kill me, wanted to bribe me to block the repeal of prohibition and is also guilty of putting three of Goliath’s synthetic Thursdays under the Savernake Forest.”

“You’ve nothing to connect me with the Stiltonistas,” said Mr. Potblack. “I happened to be here pursuing a potential property development when I was set upon by this madwoman.”

“We’ve got a trunkful of Gorgonzola here,” said one of the armed officers. “At least fifty kilos.”

“For personal use,” said Potblack in an unconvincing tone of voice.

“And your armed associates?”

“I employed them as decorators this morning. I am shocked,
shocked
to discover they are armed.”

Spike helped me to my feet and walked me across to the front of the Rolls-Royce.

“It’s good to see you again, Thursday. The Cheese Squad will have a field day with this lot. How in heaven’s name did you nail Potblack of all people? We’ve been after him for years.”

“Let’s just say I have a magnetic personality.”

Spike laughed. “Still the same. Tell me, do you want to do some moonlighting? The undead are about to be culled again, and there aren’t many with Class IV zombie hunters’ licenses about—or at least none who don’t drool a lot and mumble.”

I thought carefully. “If I’m around tomorrow, I’m totally up for it.”

It was quite fun being her. I had a sudden thought.

“Spike, if you weren’t here to arrest Potblack, what were you here for?”

“We’ve been trailing you for the past hour, Thursday.”

“Why?”

“Because if
we
know you’re here, so will
they
.”

“‘They’ being . . . ?”

“Who else? Goliath.”

“I can handle them.”

“I don’t think so,” said Spike. “You’ve been gone a month, right?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

“Three weeks ago SpecOps announced it had been privatized. The Goliath Corporation now runs not only SpecOps but the police as well. Almost the first thing Goliath did was charge you with crimes against humanity, murder, theft, illegal possession of a firearm, the discharge of a weapon in a public place, murder, impersonating a SpecOps officer, cheese smuggling, assorted motoring offenses and murder. It’s quite a list. They must
really
hate you to dream up so many spurious charges.”

“I think the feeling’s pretty much mutual. Does that mean I’m under arrest?”

“We tried to, but you escaped.” He smiled and removed the plastic cuffs with a flick knife. “Now go before Flanker gets here.”

It was too late. A group of blue-suited individuals had arrived, brandishing Goliath IDs and a lot of attitude. Their leader I recognized from the description I had in the series—Commander Flanker, once head of SO-1, the police who police the police, now presumably answering to Goliath.

“Thank you, Officer Stoker,” said Flanker, “for securing our prisoner.”

“You can have her once we’re done,” said Spike, pulling himself up to his full height—he was well over six feet six. “Miss Next is charged with the illegal possession of a firearm, and I need to process her.”

“The charge of crimes against humanity has precedence, Stoker.”

“Your bullshit charge is bigger than my bullshit charge?”

“We could argue this all night, but the outcome remains the same. She is coming with me to be interrogated at Goliathopolis.”

“Over my dead body,” said Spike.

“I’m sure that can be arranged.”

They growled at each other, but there was little, it seemed, that Spike could do. Within a half hour, I was in the back of a large automobile being driven to the Clary-LaMarr Travelport to be put on a private bullet train to Goliathopolis.

I took a deep breath. Being Thursday was exciting and was certainly distracting. I’d hardly thought about Whitby at all.

W
ell,” said Flanker as we sat in the plush interior of the bullet train, “we’ll be at Goliathopolis in an hour, and your debrief can begin.”

“Mr. Flanker, sir,” said one of the accompanying heavies, a small man with a rounded face and a crew cut like a tennis ball, “have you checked she’s not one of ours?”

“Good point,” said Flanker. “Would you be so kind?”

The two heavies needed no extra encouragement, and while one held me down, the other clasped my upper eyelid and peered underneath. It wasn’t painful, but it
was
undignified. Plus, the agent looking at my eye had been eating an onion sandwich not long before, and his breath was pretty unpleasant.

“She’s not one of our Thursdays,” said the agent, and they released me.

“I’m delighted to hear it,” I said—and I was. There were now only two possibilities for who I was: me or Thursday. “Potblack killed them all,” I added, “and had them buried in the Savernake.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” replied Flanker airily. “Goliath no longer conducts experiments into synthetics. It’s against the law. Oh,” he added, “I forgot. We
are
the law. Shall I come straight to the point? We’ve been contracted to complete Phase One of the Anti-Smite Strategic Defense Shield by the end of the year, and the penalties are severe for noncompliance. We’re not in the business of paying out severe penalties, so tell us where the secret plans are and we can release you and drop all the charges.”

It felt like covering for a character in a book without being told what the book was about, who was in it or even what your character had been doing up until then. I’d done it twice in the BookWorld, so I had some experience in these matters. But at least I was beginning to understand what was going on.

“The plans are in a safe place,” I replied, assuming they were, “but if you think you can simply ask questions and I’ll simply answer them, you’ve got another think coming.”

“Oh, this is just the preamble,” said Flanker in an unpleasant tone, “so I can tell the board that I did ask you and you refused. We can cut the information out of you, but it’s a very messy business. Now, where are the plans?”

“And I said somewhere safe.”

Flanker was quiet for a moment. “Do you have any idea how much trouble you have caused Goliath?”

“I’m hoping it’s a lot.”

“You’d be right. Just getting you off the streets is a small triumph, but we have other plans. The Goliath Advanced Weapons Division has been wanting to get hold of you for a long time.”

“I won’t help you make any weapons, Flanker.”

“It’s simpler than that, Thursday. Since you have been so devastatingly destructive to us over the years, we have decided that
you
would make the ideal weapon. We can create excellent visual copies, but none of them have the unique skills that make you the dangerous person you are. Now that we have you and that precious brain of yours, with a couple of modifications in your moral compass our Thursday Mark V will be the ultimate killing machine. Of course, the host rarely survives the procedure, but we can replace you with another copy. I’m sure Landen won’t notice. In fact, with a couple of modifications we can improve you for him—make the new Thursday more . . . compliant to his wishes.”

“What makes you think that I’m not already? If he were only a quarter of the man he is, he’d still be ten times more of a man than you.”

Flanker ignored me, and the bullet train moved off. We were soon zipping through the countryside, humming along thirty feet above the induction rail. When another bullet train passed in the opposite direction, we gently moved to the left of the induction wave, and the opposite train shot past us in a blur.

I stared at Flanker, who was sitting there grinning at me. If he could have started to laugh maniacally, he would have. But the thing was, this didn’t sound like the Flanker in my books. Pain in the ass he might have been, but Goliath lackey he most certainly wasn’t. His life was SpecOps, and although a strict rules man, that’s all he was. I had an idea.

“When did they replace you, Flanker?”

“What do you mean?”

“This isn’t you. Shit you might have been, evil-toady Goliathlackey shit you most definitely weren’t. Ever had a look at your own eyelid? Just to make sure?”

He laughed uneasily but then excused himself to the bathroom. When he came back, he looked somewhat pale and sat down in silence.

“When was I replaced?” he asked one of the heavies.

I’d not really given them much thought, but now that I looked at them, they also seemed to be vaguely familiar, as though they’d been described to me long ago. There were plenty of Goliath personalities in my book, but the litigious multinational had always insisted that no actual names could be used, nor realistic descriptions—they went further by denying that anything in the Thursday Next books ever took place, something that Thursday told me was anything but the truth.

“This morning,” said one of the heavies in a matter-of-fact tone, “and you’re due for retirement this evening. You’re what we call a day player.”

Flanker put on a good face of being unperturbed and picked up the phone that connected him to the central command for the bullet train. Before he could speak, the other heavy leaned forward and placed his finger on the “disconnect” button.

“Even if I am only a day player,” said Flanker, “I still outrank you.”

“You’re not the ranking officer here,” said the other heavy. “You’re just the friendly face of Goliath—and I say that without any sense of irony.”

Flanker looked at me, then at the heavies, then out the window. He said nothing for perhaps thirty seconds, but I knew he was going to make a move. The trouble was, so did the heavies. Flanker reached for his gun, but no sooner had he grasped the butt than he suddenly stopped, his eyes rolled upwards into his head, and he collapsed without a noise. It was as though he’d been switched off. The Goliath heavy showed me a small remote with a single button on it.

“Useful little gadget,” he said. “All our enemies should have one. Boris? Get rid of him and then fetch Miss Next a cup of tea.”