Spiral (21 page)

Carter considered this, scratching at his stubble. They would need money, wherever they were going. He nodded, smiling, and, bending down, kissed Natasha on the cheek.

‘Thanks for saving my life,’ he said. ‘Now we’re even.’

Natasha’s arm came up and pulled his head down to her. They kissed again, tongues dancing, and for a couple of seconds the world spiralled down into nothing more than this intimate moment.

Carter pulled away, his gaze locked to hers.

‘Come on. We have to get moving.’

‘Can’t we rest here? For the night?’

‘No. We have to put some serious distance between that meat fucker and us. You understand?’

‘Yeah. Can I sleep?’

‘With my blessing,’ said Carter, smiling. He kissed her again, passed her his coat and then climbed into the front seat. He started the huge engine and turned the heater up. He checked the fuel gauge, then reversed slowly from the copse, tyres crunching twigs, and out onto the lane.

‘Where are we going?’ said Natasha sleepily, snuggling under coats against the raping wind, which violated the cabin through the recently smashed windows.

‘I’ll tell you when we get there.’

‘Do we have to fly?’

‘Yes.’

‘I thought you hated flying?’

‘I do.’

‘Oh.’ Natasha snuggled against the rolled-up jacket and closed her eyes. Carter angled the rear-view mirror and watched her sleep as he drove through the darkness; the cool air from the smashed windows made him shiver occasionally as mile after mile of catseyes and the occasional midnight traveller sped by in a blur.

The horn beeped.

Carter blinked. Looked up, over the BMW’s steering wheel. Heavy rain pounded the bonnet and roof, spitting through the smashed side windows. The windscreen was awash. Thunder boomed in the dark night sky; he readjusted his mirror and saw the headlights glowing behind him like yellow eyes. The horn blared again.

‘OK, OK,’ hissed Carter. He flicked on the wipers, eased up on the clutch and took the BMW around the roundabout and off towards the south - towards the Lake District and Lancaster beyond. Glasgow was now a ghost in the night behind him...

He drove on bitterly through the rain.

It was an hour after dawn when Carter pulled the BMW into the lay-by. An hour earlier had seen him buying supplies in a service station - everything from crisps and Coke through to travel medical kits containing needles, sterile dressings and emergency airways, T-shirts that weren’t stained in blood and some mysterious items which he kept locked away in plastic bags. Now, both bandaged, scrubbed in the service-station toilets, and clad in garish coloured T-shirts, they looked at one another and Natasha ran a hand through her hair. She’d just taken some Ibuprofen - the maximum dose - but was obviously still in quite some pain ...

‘What now?’

‘We steal a plane.’

‘Steal a ... you
are
joking?’

‘Not at all,’ said Carter grimly. ‘We can’t risk requesting air transport from Spiral, and over the wire, on the other side of these trees, is an MoD airbase. A
special
airbase where they keep some of Spiral’s aircraft and other vehicles.’

‘Carter,’ said Natasha slowly, ‘there will be armed guards. Dogs. We’ve only got one gun between us.’

‘One gun is enough. I find in these situations that one gun tends to breed more guns.’

‘And you think you can fly a ... well, whatever it is you want to steal?’

‘Of course. It’s been a few years, I haven’t flown since Egypt. But they’re all the fucking same. Joystick. Rudder. Flaps. Landing gear. Hey, come on, liven up - it’s not as if we’ve been betrayed by everything we have come to know and trust and believe in. Why the grim smile?’

‘You’re mad,’ said Natasha slowly. ‘And tell me you don’t still plan to visit Gol.’

‘Yeah, I’m sorry, Nats - but I do. Gol can help us.’

‘He will shoot us. Well, you,’ she corrected.

‘Don’t overestimate him. The big oaf had a heart of gold...’

‘Yes,’ said Natasha slowly. ‘But remember? Remember when you fucking
shot him
... you can’t possibly have forgotten?’

Carter shrugged. ‘It was for the best - he’ll understand,’ came the simple reply. ‘He’s still alive, isn’t he?’

Natasha tutted. ‘Man, have you got a death wish?’ She sighed, and rubbed at her tired pain-filled eyes. ‘Where will we find the Big Man? Do you know if he’s still playing games on the African continent?’

‘I cannot divulge this information,’ said Carter with a lop-sided grin.

‘You
are
mad,’ Natasha repeated with feeling.

‘Of course. That’s why I work for Spiral.’ He coughed. ‘Used to work, I mean. You think they’ll accept my formal resignation?’

‘You don’t know that, Carter. You don’t know who sent the Nex.’

‘You said they were Spiral’s best-kept secret? Well, put two and two together.’

‘Yeah, they sometimes make seven. If you’ve still got your ECube we can try and contact—’

‘Oh no.’ Carter’s words were soft. ‘No contact. We do it my way; if it
is
Spiral, and the fuckers
are
tracking us, then the ECube will light us up worse than any flare on a winter night.’

‘But if they aren’t the ones - well, they could help,’ said Natasha simply.

‘I don’t need any fucking help,’ said Carter, his humour gone. ‘I do it on my own. I always have.’

Natasha shook her head slowly, and ran a hand through her short black hair. ‘When are we - ah, I mean
you -
going to accelerate into this mad scheme of theft from the British government?’

‘Theft. Ha.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Am I hearing you right, Nats? I am no thief... I am part of the huge machine that is Spiral, and Spiral not only have part-ownership in the MoD but own this very airfield and the equipment therein. Because I belong to Spiral, and they to me, I am merely
taking
what is already rightfully
mine.
You get it?’

‘I don’t think the armed guards will see it that way.’

‘Well, I haven’t got the time to sign in fucking triplicate.’ Carter pulled the battered Browning from his pocket. He stared lovingly at the dull black surface. ‘I am sure I will be able to persuade them with Sergeant 9mm here.’ He smiled without humour.

Night fell. With it came more rain.

Carter slammed the BMW’s door shut. The hunters would find the vehicle soon enough, he was sure - but then, hopefully, the couple would be far away from this place. Far away from the promise of bullets and pain.

Carter supported Natasha as they crept through the damp woodland. Before long they came to a heavy-duty fence topped by the customary barbed wire. ‘This is where we climb,’ said Carter softly. ‘But don’t worry - this is a pretty unimportant base and subsequently the ‘high’ security is shit. Unless the fucker has been compromised.’

Natasha stared hard at him. ‘Compromised?’

Carter nodded. ‘Somebody seems to be trying hard to bring Spiral down. There are links. Spiral keeps aircraft here at this base. It’s a long shot, but hey, so was that fucking Nex almost killing me back at my home...’ He shrugged, moved forward, and scaled the rattling fence. Using pocket cutters he snipped through the coils of barbed wire. Then he reached down, hauling a grimacing, groaning Natasha up behind him and they climbed warily over and dropped to the grass, panting, sweat stinging their eyes.

The base squatted mostly in darkness. A few dark buildings, with weak lonely yellow lights, sat over to one side of the compound. Several airstrips criss-crossed the gloom, and beside several more outbuildings sat a collection of damp and darkly glistening aircraft.

‘Can you see the markings?’ said Carter.

Natasha shook her head.

‘My eyesight is getting bad with old age, I fear,’ he said. ‘Come on.’

They made their way slowly across the grass, and Carter halted. He pointed, to where a low shed obviously housed chained dogs. Making a huge detour, they circled the base and finally scurried through the rain to crouch under the limited shelter of a galvanised roof overhang. Water poured around them from inefficient guttering, splattering and clashing. Carter pointed through the gloom. ‘You see her?’

‘What is it?’

‘A Cessna T206H Turbo5. Fully fuelled and with good range. Fast. We can sling her under radar, keep her low over the hills; she’s got excellent navigational equipment but isn’t military, and so won’t arouse too much suspicion.’

‘Are we going far?’

‘Far enough,’ said Carter. ‘You wait here, I’ll check her out.’ He moved away from Natasha, and was soon a ghost in the rain. His senses sang, and he felt incredibly awake: energy washed through him and no longer did the pain from his strapped finger, his broken ribs, his broken nose, his sliced bicep — no longer did it push him into the borders of angry red teeth-grinding acceptance. Now it flowed away and left him feeling ... alive.

He halted beside the Cessna, alert, focused, the Browning in his hand and glistening dark in the rain. Just behind the wing he reached up, found the handle and twisted, The door hissed outwards, exposing the dark interior.

Carter reached up and pulled down the steps, which clacked against the tarmac. Then he sprinted as best he could with broken ribs and gestured for Natasha to follow him, aware that his back presented a broad target to the darkness ... and to any hiding snipers...

Natasha crept forward through the rain, hair plastered to her scalp, and soon they were both climbing the steps and into the dry interior of the cramped single-engine plane.

‘Where we going, Carter?’

‘Africa.’

‘Africa! You are joking ... so I was right...’

Carter looked her in the eye. ‘Joking? Well, you want to hang around here? Try and reason with that Nex fucker?’

Natasha shook her head and, wiping water from her face, followed Carter to the cockpit.

‘Then we’ll do it my way. Belt yourself in over there.’

‘You sure you know how to fly one of these?’

‘As easy as slotting a Nex.’ He smiled bitterly.

The silver Mercedes flashed through the night, tyres hissing, squealing across wet tarmac, groaning under pressure as the vehicle hit speeds of over a hundred and fifty m.p.h. The rain smashed down from the tumultuous heavens, and the Mercedes finally pulled to a halt beside a BMW: battered and bruised, victim of a recent hard-core automobile fucking.

Boots splashed down in a puddle. The door slammed shut.

The tight grey garment turned black swiftly under the dark rain. Copper eyes stared through the downpour, through the fence and across the apparently deserted airfield. A Cessna taxied along the airstrip and, engine growling, shot up into the sky and disappeared, tail light blinking like the tiny red eye of a retreating monster. Almost immediately, alarms squealed shrilly through the rain, a tortured sound, like an animal in pain. Red lights danced across black tarmac, flashing, spiralling.

The copper eyes stared into the darkness, glinting with reflected flashing red lights for a long while after the Cessna had droned out of view. They stared, unblinking, unmoving. Then as dogs barked and the harsh sounds of military voices spread out through the rain, the figure moved, fluidly, swiftly, climbed back into the Merc and picked up the comm.

‘He’s gone,’ came the soft, asexual voice.

‘Do we know where?’

‘Of course. We know everything.’

‘Drive down to 180.770.775.’

‘180.770.775. Is he keeping below radar?’

‘Confirmed. Out.’

The engine started, tyres hissed, the silver Mercedes disappeared into the darkness with only the barking of dogs following the plumes of exhaust that dispersed into the dark and the rain - and nothing remained to provide evidence of the car’s recent passing.

Transcript of recent news incident

CodeRed_Z;

unorthodox incident scan 554781

Extract from local newspaper, Nanchang, China:

‘Several major cities in China were today left in chaos when every automated cash point affiliated to major banks in Shanghai, the newly rebuilt Qingdao, Zhengzhou, Nanchang and Kunming disgorged their entire monetary contents onto the pavements at surprised pedestrians’ feet. Panic ensued, and soon scuffles and mild rioting took place as the machines continued to pump out notes like bullets from a machine gun. Riot police were deployed to disperse the crowds, and a spokesperson for the Chinese National Bank, Chow Lien stated, “This was not just the work of a simple bug in software. We are investigating claims of a malicious employee with in-depth computing experience. Our automated machines are well protected with both software and other more traditional methods; to see something like this happen was a travesty. We have top people working on the problem even as we speak.”‘

No official explanation has been given by the Chinese Government or by the Office for Economics & Industry.

J
am stood at the top of the hill, his mouth a grim line. Behind stood Nicky, and Slater, both shocked into silence. Before them the road dropped towards - a bomb site. The
crater
where Spiral_H had burrowed under the ground before its savage chemical fucking.