Return to Wardate (9 page)

‘
Kill
her!
’ shouted Barton through Madeline’s audio system.

For the next
five minutes, Madeline tried to wriggle out of the grip so she
could activate her laser weapon with her thumb and forefinger but
the professor held on tightly. Madeline invented a whole set of new
words to insult and offend the professor. Tears rolled down the
Professor’s face but she still was thinking rationally unlike
Madeline. She didn’t want to die today.

Finally the
level of tinnitus died down and then disappeared – it was over.

Madeline burst
into tears, hugged the professors and kissed her cheek despite the
grime. She was completely inconsolable. This rebound effect lasted
for almost half an hour. Finally the tears dried up and the whole
affair was pretty much put down to experience.

‘Impressive eh?
You’ve just felt the overwhelming effect of this… whatever it is,’
said Madeline.

‘Unbelievable –
absolute genius definitely but completely out of order,’ said the
professor giving a fair and well balanced assessment.

‘Of course you
do realise your officially dead now. Until I track down who’s
behind all this and do what I’m getting pretty good at, you’ll have
to keep your head down. No answering the door to anystrangers. I
really am sorry I’ve got you involved,’ said Madeline.

‘Couldn’t be
helped, you have a job to do. Please, stay tonight. I have a spare
bed. I know what you’re thinking – it’s clean. You do realise this
grime and my stained clothes is all for effect. I’m clean
underneath… honest.

‘I will,
thanks, that’s kind of you but first I have to go for a little walk
and do a little fibbing and a little bollocking.’

‘I understand,’
said the Professor.

Madeline walked
for a few hundred yards until she came to the cliff edge with a
pebble cove below. It was blissfully peaceful. The sun was quietly
dipping on the sea, seagulls swooped by and the long grasses swayed
energetically in the wild fresh wind. Although she didn’t
particularly feel the cold, she experienced the breeze in her hair,
it was invigorating. The over exposure of her optics triggered
built in polaroid filters - she could now she the perfect sunset.
It was a wonderful place to live, perhaps one day in the distant
future she would settle down here with Adam and do her utmost to
get old together.

She turned off
the little jamming device.

‘Nuttall!’

As usual, a
short time passed before he returned her call.

‘
Madeline,
are you okay? We keep loosing connection.’

‘I’m fine,
Professor Braugenhau is dead, I sliced her with my laser,’ lied
Madeline.

‘
We all
wanted her dead for several minutes.’

‘Nuttall, am I
on loudspeaker?’

‘
Yes, why is
that a problem?’

‘For god sake
turn it off!’

‘…
Okay it’s
off.’

‘Finally… Don’t
you realise you’ve got a traitor in the camp. Haven’t you noticed,
someone is always one step ahead… Have you used the data I sent
with Adam yet?’

‘
Adam?
Haven’t seen him.’

‘For goodness
sake, what kind of ministry of intelligence are you? The last time
I spoke to him he was on his way to you in
your
helicopter…
I assume it was your helicopter?’

‘
Right,
right, leave it with us, I’ll get someone to go over the CCTV
footage.’

‘No, please… do
it yourself, the traitor could be anyone. For some unfathomable
reason, you’re the only one there I trust.’

‘
Don’t
worry, we’ll find him.’

Nuttall, if you
want me to find this Mark Titoo, I need a bit of
professionalism.’

‘
Okay, okay,
point taken,’
replied Nuttall.

There was no
denying that Madeline was enjoying the moment. Nuttall had been a
bully, had been demanding and cruelly unyielding but now, in
Madeline’s eyes, he was been properly put in his place. She was now
beginning to realise that it was her mission which meant she would
have to do it all – she was a one woman army.

She turned the
jamming device back on.

Chapter 15:
Coley, polite to the end

The return
journey was definitely an anticlimax. As soon as the beautiful
Scottish islands disappeared in the rear view mirror the grey
mundane motorway appeared in front of her. From now on the journey
was motorway, more motorway and then a bit more motorway. She
wondered if the trip had been worth it. The Professor almost got
killed – by her hand and now she was officially dead. So clearly
the answer was no. The other people, scientists, and professors who
worked with her all those years ago had not produced any leads… but
there was something. Two innocent pieces of information that meant
nothing on their own but when joined together meant an awful lot.
Madeline didn’t know this, she just had a sixth sense that she had
missed something. Unfortunately her human brain was insufficient to
process all the data of her recent encounter, correlate the facts
and come up with a lead as would a real robot. She turned her
jamming device on.

‘Barton, how
am… are things?’

‘
You… are
fine, if that’s what you mean.’

‘Any ideas how
I can become screened from this ultrasound? That ‘V’ room seemed to
do the trick. What do you think did the screening - the lead, the
thick concrete, the high voltage?’

‘
If it’s
just straight forward ultrasound it’s probably just being absorbed
by the earth. How far down did you say this ‘V’ room is?’

‘Thirty
metres.’

‘
There you
are then, takes a lot to get through 30 metres of soil, clay and
rock.’

‘Any chance of
putting thirty metres of soil around my tank?’

‘
I’ll see
what I can do, leave it to me.’

‘You’re a star,
lots of love.’

She did it
again. It was habitual but not false at all. She always said lots
of love to her mother and used to put LOL on the end of her text
messages - that was perfectly fine. Barton would just have to
accept it, he was Pops - like a father to her and that was
that.

Madeline Bull
had pointed out the obvious; there was a traitor in MI 7. Someone
was apparently working for the enemy and clearly very close to
Nuttall. Rarely was there need to examine the footage or even watch
the cameras so the CCTV room was mostly unmanned.

‘Going for a
coffee,’ said Nuttall hoping he wouldn’t be accompanied.

Never before
had he had to slink around but anyone could be the traitor.
Eventually he reached the CCTV room, went in and locked the door
behind him. He examined the previous day’s footage, morning was
selected. Finally the footage of the helicopter landing was
displayed. He watched Pike greeting Adam and then Pike delegating
someone, who had his back to the camera, to escort Adam. Who the
hell is that, said Nuttall to himself. He followed a series of
cameras to the far west wing of the building, watched Adam being
forced into a room. Finally the person turned around to face the
camera.

‘Well, well,
well, Chris Coley. Who would of thought,’ said Nuttall.

A few seconds
later there was a knock at the door. Nuttall turned the monitor
off, unlocked the door and returned to the seat with his back to
the door. A young good looking tall man with shoulder length dark
brown hair walked in –it was Chris Coley.

‘Are you all
right sir?’ he asked politely.

‘Fine, fine…
you?’ said Nuttall, keeping his back to him.

‘Yes Sir. I
hope everything is to your approval,’ said Coley nervously.

‘Certainly – if
anything, I believe you’ve gone slightly beyond the call of duty,’
said Nuttall.

‘Sorry, really
not following you sir,’ said Coley.’

‘Oh… I think
you do.’

Nuttall was
prepared, Coley wasn’t despite having a loaded gun in his holster.
Nuttall swung around on his chair and rapidly fired three bullets
into Coley’s chest.

‘Are you all
right! Everything to your approval! Sorry, sorry, sorry… sir, sir,
sir… what a creep!’ said Nuttall to himself.

Nuttall made no
attempt to clean up but deleted the camera footage from the
previous day before he left the CCTV room.

The safest
place in Capesdown hall was the ‘V’ room but Adam was too hungry
and thirsty to be there, he hadn’t eaten or drank anything for over
a day. Despite yelling, shouting and screaming, no one had heard
him. No one ever ventured down the far end of the west wing. He
could have been there for months, undiscovered. Of course, by then
he would have been all skin and bone and dead. As it happened,
Coley had purposely left the door unlocked so he could escape when
ever he wanted - but Adam never thought to try the door, he assumed
it was locked.

Nuttall had
apparently exposed his traitor – Coley was made an example of – he
was mercilessly killed. Nuttall clearly would not stand for any
insubordination.

The canteen
seemed like a perfectly safe place to compare notes whilst Adam
chomped through a large English breakfast. Despite Coley being
revealed as the MI7 traitor, his name didn’t appear on the memory
stick – he was not a Resident of Wardate, of course he wasn’t.

Coley’s life
had ended abruptly. He had impeccable credentials and came to MI7
with a glowing reference from Paul Brownsword of all people. He
gained a first class honours degree at Oxford and in his time had
played hooker for the Harlequins. Sadly, he left a wife and two
young daughters behind. Despite this, he wasn’t even allowed a
proper funeral.

Nuttall ordered
his staff to search his belonging. They found an empty small tin
box. It was lined in black felt and had two small indents. Small
traces of earwax were a clear indication of what was missing.
Inside Coley’s ears were tiny devices like hearing aids. No one
would have seen them as his long hair covered his ears up. There
was no doubt that the function of these devices was to cancel the
ultrasound. The devices were sent to the lab. They also examined
his Mobile phone.

Madeline
decided to stop off at Capesdown Hall – more than anything, she
wanted to see Adam. Pike met her at the entrance and escorted her
to Nuttall. Adam was by Nuttall’s side in his office. She checked
that Adam had been well treated, well fed and had no bullet wounds
anywhere before she turned to Nuttall.

‘So, have you
got anywhere? The traitor problem solved?’

‘It was Coley,
one of my best men, still can’t believe it. The boys in the lab are
examining some devices he had in his ears which I assume masked the
ultrasound. That’s about it. You achieve anything apart from
killing Professor Braugenhau?’

Madeline dearly
wanted to laser the cynical look off his face but she refused to
stoop to his level.

‘She was a
lovely lady and if you had your own house in order, it wouldn’t
have happened,’ Madeline raised her voice slightly.

Nuttall, once
again, was put in his place. Adam nodded his head with
approval.

‘I can’t
believe I got locked away under your noses,’ said Adam.

‘Well all
that’s behind us now… We’re investigating one or two leads from
Coley’s phone,’ said Nuttall.

‘Right, we’ll
go back to the inn then,’

‘Before you go…
we seem to be having trouble with the monitoring system we
installed in you - must be the graphene lattice under your skin
interfering with the signal.’ Nuttall reached into his desk drawer.
‘This is the latest state of the art, smart satellite phone wrist
watch not available to the general public - sixty grand’s worth.
Wear it and don’t loose it!’

‘Wow real James
Bond stuff!’ said Adam excitedly.

‘James who?’
said Nuttall.

Chapter 16:
The hate begins

Throughout the
world it began.

Hardly
perceptible – a very faint high pitched noise influencing every
single person on earth. Only when it was perfect quiet could you
hear it and then, only when it was pointed out. The faint noise had
to be deciphered, only the subconscious brain could do this, to the
conscious, it was just a faint hiss. Not irritating, not invasive,
not unpleasant, unnoticed by most. This was ultrasound.

Madeline and
Adam were left alone for many days. They knew it couldn’t last but
they made the most of their time together. They could have
journeyed back down south to familiar territory but Cheshire was
pleasant and picturesque and the Inn was welcoming. Every evening
in the snug, Adam would have his pint and Madeline her gin and
tonic through a straw in her tank – it was all the same. Now used
to her situation, life went on, she knew no different – well,
actually, she did.

She now felt
well and strong. Drugs were no longer in her veins. Barton had
mended her, made her well and was caring for her. On top of all
this he had moved her real body to an undisclosed location. She
knew full well that Barton couldn’t spend every minute of the day
with her other self, he had a family, a wife and presumably a job
but he seemed to be always there when Madeline called him.

Their
conversation never dried up, Madeline always had so much to talk
about and Adam loved to listen.

‘What’s been
the best bit up of your life as Madeline Bull?’ asked Adam.

‘Easy, the Isle
of Sky. When this mission is over…’

‘When…’
repeated Adam.

‘…I’d like to
go back. It’s a wonderful place.’

‘Ok, it’s a
deal… so what’s been the worst?’

‘Don’t even
have to think about it – my time in America - horrible place,
horrible people. It wants wiping off the face of the Earth.’

‘I agree, god
knows why we don’t all get together and finish them off,’ said Adam
with clear rage.