The Three Most Wanted Read online

  Hugo’s collar slipped from his other hand and the dog leapt for the Captain, snarling. I made a hasty grab and dragged him back—Jon rubbed his fur and wheezed, “Shss, shss,” rather frantically.

  “Bit of a rushed job,” smirked the Captain, ignoring the angry dog. “Rather wasteful, I imagine.”

  The foul, evil… trying to wring every scrap of pain from the old man… Mercifully François hardly seemed to hear. He held the boxes to his chest now, one in each hand, silent tears running down his cheeks. I had to look away from the desolation on his face.

  “But,” went on the Captain, “since the EuroGov does not do deals with criminals, naturally no one must know.”

  I glanced at him, saw the gleam of anticipation in his cruel eyes.

  “François,” I said quickly. “François, I forgive you.”

  Jon’s head rose. “I forgive you too, François, do you hear me?”

  François’s head turned, his eyes focusing slightly. “Je suis désolé.” His voice caught so badly it was hard to make the words out. “I’m sorry... I just wanted… I just wanted to save them...”

  “We know,” said Jon. “It’s okay.”

  “Okay,” snorted the Captain. “How very touching. I didn’t know any definition of okay applied to Full Conscious Dismantlement.”

  My stomach lurched, my throat closed—I clutched Jon’s shoulder, squeezing my eyes shut. Breathe, Margo, just breathe...

  When I opened my eyes again François’s face had crumpled in on itself, crushed by grief and guilt.

  “I forgive you,” I whispered, meeting his eyes. Please believe me…

  “Well, the EuroGov doesn’t.” The Captain drew his Lethal. “François Bernier, you have been found guilty by your own admission of Sedition, Category One, for which the penalty is death. Your organs being so old and useless, justice to be rendered a little more directly.”

  He raised the pistol and fired point blank into the old man’s face. I shut my eyes a second too late—when I opened them again François lay on his back, a box resting beside each outflung hand. Hugo strained against Jon’s grip, barking furiously.

  I took a step towards the Captain—Jon’s arm tightened around me, holding me back much as his other hand held the dog. He couldn’t hold my tongue, though. “You filthy bastard slave of a corrupt satanic kakistocracy…”

  The Captain’s fist flew out and caught me in the face, sending me hurtling back into the wall. Everything went vague and confused, like looking through cotton wool. Spinning cotton wool. As if in a dream—nightmare—I saw Hugo pull free of Jon as he reeled from trying to stop my fall. The dog went straight for the Captain’s throat—with shocking speed the pistol appeared in the man’s hand again—a crack and a horrible whine and Hugo went down in a thrashing heap.

  “Get them outside,” ordered the Captain.

  “For pity’s sake!” shouted Jon, pointing towards the whimpering dog, now kicking its life out on the carpet. “But I s’pose you don’t know what pity is, do you!”

  The Captain drove his boot into the dog, drawing an agonized yelp, and Jon leapt at him. A vicious shove from the Captain and he landed on me, hard. Even the muzzy nightmare lost clarity...

  ...A strong smell of petrol... I lay on the garden path, my head in Jon’s lap. Blood ran down Jon’s face from his nose. Several soldiers were unscrewing the lids of petrol cans and chucking them into the cottage. A whining and scrabbling came faintly from within.

  “Bastard…” I gasped, struggling into a sitting position.

  The Captain ignored me, focused now on his work. Why was this secret, anyway? No one would consider this a bargain made with a criminal… not kept, anyway. Ah, the secrecy wasn’t for the general population but for all those who might yet be tempted into trying such a bargain. Wouldn’t want to scare them off.

  “Get them in,” the Captain ordered the soldiers standing over us.

  A small secure transport van had been backed up to the garden gate. The soldiers hauled us both to our feet and marched us to it; shoved us up into the back. Two of them climbed in and sat opposite, rifles trained on us.

  The Captain leant in to speak to them. “This door does not open until we reach the Detention Facility, understood? Be aware, they may try to provoke you. Shoot them in the leg if necessary, but don’t kill them—the bosses would prefer them alive.”

  “Sir.”

  “Sir.”

  The Captain slammed the doors shut. Through the bulletproof rear window, we could see him issuing final orders to the other soldiers, clearly remaining behind to carry on the hunt for Bane, then he got into the passenger seat and nodded to the driver. Bumping forward, the van maneuvered around the troop transport truck and onto the drive. The cottage was barely out of sight when a pillar of black smoke began rising above the treetops.

  Lord, let that poor dog die quickly. And receive François, Jean, and Philippe to yourself.

  Then... nothing to think about but… where we were going. The word Facility had started strange cold shudders all down my spine.

  Would it happen quickly, when we got there? Would they just give me the injection straight away? Or try again to break me? The final instruction to the dismantlers had already been signed, hadn’t it? The final instruction… the final instruction… the dismantlers…

  “It’s okay,” Jon whispered into my hair—I fought free of my mental maelstrom enough to realize I was sobbing into his gaunt chest. “It’s okay…”

  Unfortunately the evil Captain was right: there was nothing “okay” about what awaited me. An icy ball of panic had taken the place of my stomach, and my heart juddered in terror.

  Why had we even tried this crazy trek? Now all was lost…

  The thought of the dismantlement itself drove all reason from my mind; the thought they might try to break me plunged me into a dark place of mindless dread I’d never had the misfortune to visit before.

  ‘Cause I’d barely held out last time…

  No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no…

  ...There was sound, a gentle humming. Familiar. Soothing. It floated into the darkness of my fear and drew me up and out, towards the light. A tune. A tune that summoned words into my mind, words which acted as a blowtorch on the icy blackness.

  Ipse tantum est petra mea et salus mea,

  Praesidium meum: non movebor.

  The Lord is my stronghold and my deliverer,

  my protector: I will stand unmoved.

  I clung to the tune and the remembered words, allowed them to tow me to the surface, where I found… Jon. Of course. Jon rocking me gently, his hands rubbing my hair and back as he hummed that lifeline.

  Breathing shallowly, I clung to the psalmody, let it fill my mind and drive the terror away.

  Lord, please don’t let them try to break me. Please don’t let them try. The prayer came at last. Let them just give me the injection. I might be able to hold out that long…

  “What if they break me, Jon?” I whispered in Latin, regaining the use of my voice.

  He hummed a few more bars, still rocking me slowly, slowly.

  “All you have to do is your best,” he murmured. “Just do your best, and the Lord’s mercy will take care of the rest. But they probably won’t try again and if they do, I don’t think they will.”

  “How d’you know!”

  “Think it through, Margo.” His lips brushed the top of my head and he must’ve felt my breathing speed up, because he started humming again.

  I grabbed the sound once more, clung to it. Think it through? How would that help? Because I could see it, all too clearly, back on that gurney, with those swine tempting and threatening, could hear those awful words squeaking from my cowardly throat. I shuddered and burrowed against Jon.

  They’d still dismantle me in the normal way for the Sedition charge, of course. But not before they’d paraded me in front of the press, had me say it again and again… I choked, my head flying up. “I will not s
ay it in front of the press! I will not.”

  Jon was right. I wouldn’t say it to the press. So how many times could I get myself on and off the gurney, like that? I must hold silent: simply no point doing anything else.

  I rested my head against Jon’s shoulder, breathing as though I’d just run a race, and looked through the cab and out the windscreen. Forest. From the way we bounced and jounced, we were still on the drive.

  “Wish you hadn’t come out, Jon.”

  “What, you’d rather I was still in the house! I beg to differ.”

  “You know what I mean. I wish you were free like Bane.”

  “Never mind me. I wish you were free like Bane. Or instead of. And I can say that as his friend because I’m absolutely certain he’d agree.”

  “It was meant to be me who was free,” I whispered. “François asked me to go out to the woodshed. But Bane went instead.” Jon should know, however briefly, that François hadn’t meant me to die like this.

  “Oh. Poor Bane. François’s dead, isn’t he. And his sons.” It wasn’t a question. He’d followed what was going on just fine.

  “Yes,” I murmured anyway. “Requiescant in pace.”

  “Requiescant in pace,” sighed Jon. “Stupid thing to do, though.”

  Never a good idea. He’d been right, of course. You never got more from the devil than he took, but it could be hard to remember that when he had something you wanted so much. François’s sons. Probably the only thing for which he’d have betrayed us.

  Wearing only François’s wife’s ripped blouse over her ill-fitting bra, I was shivering. My jacket, complete with my bookReader and photos and everything, was back in the cottage, being devoured by the flames. One lonely button remained on the blouse—I fastened it and huddled closer to Jon’s warmth, my arms wrapping around his back. Easy to be resolute and calm—comparatively—with him beside me.

  Which of us would they take first? I swallowed down resurging panic and closed my eyes, breathing in his oh-so-familiar Jon scent.

  “If… you’re first, I’ll be praying for you,” he murmured in my ear. “Don’t forget it.”

  Mind reader.

  “And vice versa.”

  He gave a faint snort. “Yeah, well, I’ll just be snoozing my way into the next life, don’t worry yourself about me.” A moment’s silence. “Margo, anything I’ve ever done to you, I’m really sorry.”

  My turn to snort. “You’ve never done anything to me, Jon, nothing bad, anyway. Anything I’ve ever done to you, I’m sorry… I’m so sorry for.” Letting you fall in love with me, for example…

  “Margo, you have nothing to apologize for. Nothing.”

  We were silent for a while, then the van went over a particularly vicious pothole and one of the guards cursed.

  “Longest bloody driveway ever,” he grumbled in Esperanto. French accent.

  “You know these country places.” His companion sounded German. SpecialCorps was multi-departmental, wasn’t it? “Anyway, only twenty kilometers to the Facility once we hit the main road. Could be worse, eh?”

  My blood chilled again. Twenty kilometers. A fairly short trip, even on curving mountain roads like the ones around here. I tucked my nose under Jon’s chin again, clasping my hands behind his back.

  “Jon, you’re my best friend and I love you, you know that, right?” I pressed a kiss onto his neck since his face was half covered in beard and rested my cheek on his shoulder again, swallowing back a sudden wave of tears as I turned my engagement ring on my finger. Oh, Bane—former best friend, current fiancé... never to be husband...

  “I know, Margo. Love you too.” His lips caressed the scar on my forehead. No best friend qualification from him.

  His nose slid into my hair, putting his lips by my ear. “Now we’ve dealt with all these very important matters, tell me, is there any possible way of getting out of here?”

  In other words, now that you’ve stopped being catatonic, Margo, look around for me, will you?

  Under cover of looking out the front, I stole a glance at the guards. Eyes fixed unwaveringly on us and their grips on their rifles firm.

  “The guards are very alert,” I said just as quietly, despite the fact we were both speaking Latin. “If we try and jump them they’ll probably just shoot us somewhere non-fatal: you heard the Captain. And getting out…” I turned as though to see out the back windscreen. “It’s a code lock. We can’t get out without shaking the code out of the guards or getting someone to open it from outside.” I sorted through my confused recollections of being loaded into the vehicle. “No, it’s code locked from outside as well. Damn, I hate code locks.”

  If every lock in the Facility had been a code lock with a covered keypad, we’d all still be there. Hellishly difficult to get around—unless you’d a lot of cash handy.

  Jon gave just the tiniest wince. “Doesn’t sound too encouraging.”

  “’Fraid not.”

  “By the time we get there it’ll be too late. Let’s see. We can’t reach the driver. What’s the back like? Bulletproof?”

  “Looks like it.”

  “Well, if we can’t think of anything else by the time we’re a bit closer, perhaps we should just throw ourselves on the guards and give it our best shot.”

  Translation, if it works, wow, brilliant; if not, well, we might just get some nice lethal ricochets flying around back here.

  “Up for it?” he asked.

  Nothing wrong with an escape attempt. “Yeah, count me in.”

  “Right.”

  I settled closer to him and he snugged his arms more firmly around me, starting on a rosary. I joined him, the better to avoid spiraling back into that black place of fear. The van bounced on up the drive and other than the soldiers’ occasional curses and our soft murmur all was silent in the back.

  My mind was jolted from its only marginally successful attempt to meditate on Our Lord’s Agony in the Garden as the van bumped to a halt. In the cab, the Captain threw up his hands in a frustrated gesture; the driver spread his in the universal disclamation of responsibility.

  “Which idiot shut that?” echoed one of our guards.

  “Don’t look at me,” said the other. “I never got out of the truck.”

  Oh, there was the cause of all the irritation. The gate at the end of François’s endless driveway had been closed by whichever over-zealous soldier opened it. Of course, if by some miracle we’d got hold of François’s pickup and made a run for it, the overzealous idiot would be getting accolades for foresight and using his initiative.

  The Captain flung his door open, slid out, slammed it shut, and strode up to the gates, opening them and dropping the gatestops to hold them open. Good strong gates—in that other reality, they probably would’ve stopped the old vehicle.

  The Captain freed the last gatestop—and a dark shape darted from the forest and yanked open the driver’s door.

  ***+***

  16

  FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES

  “Bane!” I gasped. Jon froze; I could practically see his ears straining.

  A glint of silver and the driver went rigid. Bane’s lips moved, some fierce command—but the driver cut the engine. The Captain turned, his hand went to his right hip, drawing the Lethal, but Bane was behind the door.

  The driver still didn’t move. Bane snapped something else, and from the man’s flinch and the rapidity with which he suddenly vacated the vehicle, Bane’s words weren’t the only thing that had pierced his skin.

  The Captain fired twice as Bane dived into the driver’s seat—the shots ricocheted off door and hood, missing the gap between—he began to sprint towards the van and he was fast. Bane slammed the door and scanned the control panel… quick, quick, quick!

  Snick.

  The doors locked just as the Captain lunged for the handle. Our guards watched, wide-eyed, paralyzed with indecision. Don’t open the door until you reach the Facility…

  The Captain stepped back and began firing m
ethodically into the lock. Fumbling with the controls, Bane ignored him. The engine roared back into life: Bane slammed the van into gear, the wheels spun and we were off, tearing through the gates and onto the marginally-smoother road beyond. The Captain fired several more shots after us—at our tires, from the slant of his pistol.

  Of course, this not being a movie, he missed, pistols being decidedly inaccurate things over any distance whatsoever, or so our new driver had told me often enough.

  “I’m guessing Bane’s now driving…” gasped Jon, feet against the opposite seat and one arm withdrawn from around me to brace us against the front of the van. I’d adopted a similar position, my free arm against the rear window.

  “Yep,” I gasped back.

  Bane kept up the insane speed, throwing us around the bends as the road left the valley floor and climbed quickly up towards the next pass, growing steep and flanked by precipices. It wasn’t me and Jon he was trying to shake around, of course. Gasping as they were flung to and fro, the two guards held a muffled conversation involving a lot of “Buts…?” and “Whats…?” and not many conclusions.

  We reached an unusually straight stretch of road with the usual mountainside on the right and precipice on the left, the entire forested valley stretched out below us—enough to give anyone vertigo, no matter how serious the situation.

  Bane brought the van to a screeching halt and all four of us flew forward and smacked into the window—the guards recovered quickly and trained their rifles on us again.

  “Sit back,” one of them snapped. “You sit there and don’t make any sudden moves.”

  We were quite happy to sit and get our breath back whilst Bane took the vehicle out of gear, put the handbrake on and hunted for the intercom button.

  “Are you two okay?” His voice filled the small gloomy compartment as he peered through the window.

  “We’re fine.” No point babbling just at the moment. How did he plan to get us out?

  His attention shifted to the soldiers and his face hardened. “Open the door and let them out.”

  The French soldier snorted. “Oh, oui, and would you like a glass of wine, while I’m at it?”