by Jack Heath
The black van screeches to a stop right in front of you. The side door rolls open. Three men and one woman leap out. All of them have black boots, mirrored sunglasses and woollen beanies. One of the men wears grey overalls with ‘Spencer’s Air Conditioning Repair’ written on the back. The other three are dressed in black.
There’s something frightening about them. You take a step backwards. They move like soldiers, and they’re bigger than you. The woman has a scar, which runs from her eyebrow down to the corner of her mouth. One of the men has a picture of a knife tattooed on his muscular arm. Another has a large signet ring on one of his fingers. The guy in the overalls has a silver tooth.
They run straight past you and disappear into the HBS bank. The van zooms away, leaving a haze of exhaust in the cold morning air. The echoes of the engine die away.
You look around. Cars cruise along the street. Trucks roll in and out of the warehouse across the road. It’s barely light—at this time of year the sun doesn’t rise until almost eight—but surely someone else must have seen the black van and its sinister passengers.
If anyone did, they don’t seem to care.
Pedestrians wander past you, heads down. No-one has reacted.
The bank doesn’t look like a bank. If not for the ATM-finder app on Kye’s phone, you would have walked right past it. There are no signs on the concrete walls. Shutters cover the few windows. But it’s open, which most banks aren’t when it’s this early.
Kye entered a minute ago to deposit some cash. He said he’d be right back. What if he meets the four strangers from the van? What if they are dangerous?
You whip out your phone and call Kye. But the call doesn’t connect, not even to his voicemail. Weird.
You could phone the police. But what would you say? It’s not a crime to wear black, or to have a scar, or to run into a bank. The van might have been speeding, but that’s it. The cops will think it’s nothing. It probably is nothing.
Maybe you should quickly go into the bank, grab Kye and get out. Then you can both decide what to do. You might even get a better look at the four strangers. You could see something that proves they’re innocent . . . or they’re not.
If you go into the bank, Click Here.
If you call the cops, Click Here.
‘Jacob,’ you say.
‘Full name,’ Miss Scarlet says.
‘Jacob Catton,’ you stammer.
She holds out her hand. ‘Let’s see your ID, “Jacob Catton”.’
All you have is a student card. You hand it over with a trembling hand.
She looks at it, thinking, and then pockets it. ‘OK,’ she says. ‘The bankers should be calling the police right now. When the cops arrive, they’ll call the phone in the staff room. When it rings, you’re going to pick it up and say exactly what I tell you to. One word wrong, and your little friend here gets it.’
She points the laser pistol at Kye. The colour drains out of his face.
‘You don’t have to threaten him,’ you say quickly. ‘I’ll do whatever you want.’
‘Yes,’ she says. ‘You will. Now—’
A shrill whistle cuts through the air. Miss Scarlet turns to look at the melted hole in the glass at the counter.
‘Something’s wrong,’ Mr Sharp says.
Miss Scarlet shushes him. They both move away towards the counter, out of your sight.
While they’re distracted, you scan your surroundings, looking for a way out. The air conditioner catches your eye. It’s not properly attached to the wall—and you can see a vent behind it. The vent looks just big enough to crawl through. That must be why Miss Scarlet didn’t want you near it.
Can you and the other hostages get out of sight before the bad guys turn around?
If you lead the other hostages into the vent, Click Here.
If you don’t risk it, Click Here.
You look both ways, and then run into the HBS bank. A sliding door lets you into a small foyer, with a security camera and a pair of ATMs. No people. This room is just an airlock, keeping the winter out.
A second door opens, and you slip through into a larger room. Dotted lines on the soft grey carpet show customers where to go. One woman is selecting options on a touchscreen. A printer below it spits out a numbered ticket. The woman takes it and sits down on an orange bench next to two other people, both with tickets in their hands.
Kye—a gangly boy with curly blond hair and glasses—is at one of the counters, chatting with a bank teller. He always talks too much, especially to people who are just trying to do their jobs in peace.
You wonder if the teller can even hear him. There’s a thick window between him and her. A sign says, WARNING. SECURITY SHUTTER RISES QUICKLY.
The big guy with the knife tattoo—in your head you call him Mr Sharp—is standing near the door. Not blocking it, exactly. Like everyone else in here, he looks like he’s waiting for something. Nervously, you walk past him towards Kye.
One of the other men—the man with a signet ring—looms next to the orange bench, a grim smile on his face. He doesn’t appear to have a ticket.
The woman with the scar stands in a corner, the hood of her jacket pulled over her head. She’s directly under a security camera—in its blind spot.
You can’t see the man with the silver tooth and the overalls anywhere.
Kye finishes talking to the teller, takes his receipt through the gap under the glass and starts walking to the exit. He slows down when he sees you.
‘Hey,’ he says. ‘You get lonely out there?’
‘Hurry up,’ you say.
A bell rings, and a message flashes up on a screen: Now serving ticket 81 at counter 2.
One of the people on the bench—a middle-aged woman wearing a fluffy scarf—stands up. The guy with the signet ring peels himself off the wall and approaches counter 2, where Kye just was.
The woman with the scarf looks down at her ticket, confused.
You and Kye walk towards the exit.
‘Get ready to run,’ you whisper. ‘I think those guys are robbers.’
‘They’re what?’ Kye asks, too loudly.
Mr Sharp’s eyes narrow.
Someone screams. You turn in time to see the guy with the signet ring throw a grenade at the bank teller.
She reacts immediately, kicking something under the counter. A steel shutter shoots upwards, covering the glass. A deafening alarm shrieks.
With a loud clank, Mr Signet’s grenade expands into a giant ball of crooked spikes. The spikes get jammed between the shutter and the ceiling, stopping it from rising all the way. About half a metre of glass is exposed.
Before you can run, another shutter crashes down over the exit. You and Kye are trapped!
The woman with the scar pulls out a gun-shaped object. She points it at the security camera above her head and pulls the trigger. A purple laser shoots out of the muzzle and bores a hole right through the camera. She steps out of the way in time to avoid the falling chunks of blackened metal and plastic.
Then she takes off her hood and her beanie, revealing a mane of blood-red hair.
‘You’ve all seen movies,’ she says. ‘You know what a bank robbery looks like.’
She tosses the laser gun to Mr Signet. He climbs up onto the counter and starts melting the exposed glass.
‘In twenty-five minutes you all get to walk out of here,’ says Miss Scarlet—the redhead with the scar. ‘No-one is going to get hurt, because no-one is going to do anything foolish. Right?’
Everyone stares at her in terrified silence.
‘Right?’ she says again.
You nod hurriedly. Kye and the other customers do the same. But you wonder if she’s telling the truth. She melted the camera so it wouldn’t see her face. You and all
the other customers have seen it. Will she really let you go?
‘You’re all going to sit over there.’ She points to the corner. ‘Backs against the wall, hands where I can see them.’
Mr Signet has finished cutting through the glass with the laser pistol. The edges of the hole glow like hot coals. He throws the gun back to Miss Scarlet. Then he pulls on some gloves, clambers through the gap and disappears.
You and the rest of the hostages shuffle over towards the wall. Miss Scarlet watches you closely.
She holds up a device which looks like a cross between a wi-fi router and a walkie-talkie. Antennas bristle from the top, and red lights blink along one side. ‘This is a multi-band frequency jammer,’ she continues, ‘with a range of sixty metres. Your mobile phones won’t work in here, so don’t try.’
That explains why you couldn’t call Kye from outside. You look at him. His eyes are wide.
The alarm suddenly stops. Mr Signet must have found a way to switch it off.
Miss Scarlet holds up the laser gun. ‘You’ve just seen what this does to three inches of bulletproof glass,’ she says. ‘Do you know what else it can do?’
No-one says anything.
‘Behave yourselves,’ Miss Scarlet says, ‘and you won’t find out. You!’
She points at you. Your heart leaps into your mouth.
‘Move away from the AC,’ she says.
You’re sitting right next to the air conditioning unit. It isn’t switched on. It doesn’t even look like it’s attached to the wall properly—the underside rests on the floor. You scoot away from it. Miss Scarlet must not want you near it because then you wouldn’t be visible from the counter.
‘What’s your name, kid?’ she asks.
If you say ‘Jacob’, Click Here.
If you say ‘Brianna’, Click Here.
You dig out your phone and dial emergency services. Once again, the call doesn’t connect. You check the screen. The signal strength is good. There must be something wrong with your phone.
You look around. Maybe a pedestrian will let you borrow their phone.
And then you see a police officer, standing on the street corner near a patrol car.
Unable to believe your luck, you run over to him. He’s observing the street very carefully, perhaps looking for someone in particular. He’s clean-shaven, with hazel eyes and dirty blond hair peeking out from under his police cap.
‘Excuse me.’
He looks at you, but doesn’t say anything.
‘I think that bank is getting robbed,’ you say.
His eyes widen. He looks at the bank, then at you. He scans the street again.
‘Four suspicious-looking people just went in,’ you continue. ‘And then their van sped off.’
‘I see,’ he says. ‘Suspicious-looking? In what way?’
Feeling silly, you say, ‘They were wearing black, and they were running.’
The officer smiles slightly. ‘That doesn’t sound like anything to worry about.’
‘Come with me,’ you say. ‘I’ll show you.’
‘No, you go home,’ he says. ‘I’ll keep an eye on things here.’
Kye could be in danger, but this police officer isn’t taking you seriously. Maybe he would listen if you exaggerated a little bit.
If you tell him the robbers had guns and ski masks, Click Here.
If you go back to the bank and try to sneak in, Click Here.
As quietly as you can, you lift the air conditioning unit away from the wall. It makes a faint scraping sound, but Miss Scarlet and Mr Sharp don’t seem to notice. You can hear them hissing instructions through the hole in the glass.
The other hostages stare at you in silent horror. They think you’re going to get them into trouble. Ignoring them, you shift the air conditioning unit out of your way, exposing the air vent.
It’s narrower than it looked at first. But it’s too late for second thoughts. You beckon to the others, and wriggle into the darkness.
The aluminium walls are tight around your shoulders. It’s hard to crawl quickly or quietly. Your knees keep getting jammed up. But soon you’re in far enough that there’s room for Kye to crawl in behind you.
‘You’re crazy,’ he whispers.
Ignoring him, you keep pulling yourself into the gloom. You start to feel claustrophobic. There’s barely enough room to lift your head, let alone turn around. For an air vent, there doesn’t seem to be much air.
Hands and shoes shuffle and thump behind you. It sounds like the other hostages—two women and a man—have decided to follow you and Kye into the tunnel.
There’s a sharp corner up ahead. If you can get around it, the woman with the laser pistol won’t be able to target you from the entrance. But it’s going to be a tight squeeze.
You roll onto your back and brace your arms against the ceiling so you can squirm around the corner. The sharp edge scrapes your hip and stomach, but you make it. There’s a grille in the floor, leading down to what looks like a room below.
But in the shadows on the other side of the grille, you can see the fourth robber. The man with the silver tooth. That must be why he was wearing the air conditioner repair overalls—so he could take the unit off the wall and crawl into the vent without anyone stopping him.
He hasn’t seen you yet. He’s fiddling with a phone. Perhaps you can push through the grille and get into the room below before he spots you. Or maybe you should sneak up on him and try to snatch the phone out of his hands, so he can’t warn the other robbers.
If you push through the grille to escape into the room below, Click Here.
If you charge at the man with the silver tooth, Click Here.
‘Help everyone else get down from the vent,’ you tell Kye. You run over to the wall and wrench the fire axe off the cradle.
An alarm shrieks. It’s a harsh beeping sound—different from the shrill jingle of the robbery alarm. You ignore it and run up the first flight of stairs towards the door with the security shutter.
‘Quick!’ Kye yells to the others. ‘Jump!’
You hope he can get everyone into the stairwell before Mr Silver wakes up, or one of the other robbers finds you all.
The axe is much heavier than they look on TV—actors must use plastic axes. You swing it with all your might.
The blade slams into the shutter. It doesn’t break through the steel, but leaves a shallow dent. You raise it and swing again.
Crash! The shutter still holds.
‘Watch out!’ Kye cries.
You whirl around. The other three hostages are cowering in the corners of the stairwell. Miss Scarlet is hanging upside down out of the vent, holding her laser pistol. She takes aim at you.
You turn to run further up the stairs—
And you crash into Mr Sharp. He’s come down from the floor above. He looks furious.
He wrenches the axe out of your grip.
You raise your hands. ‘No, no!’
He swings the axe towards you but you dive backwards before he can strike—
And your feet come down on a step that isn’t there.
You jumped too far. You’re falling. Your arms pinwheel as you tumble backwards towards the concrete floor . . .
Smack!
THE END.
To try again, Click Here.
You scoot away from the air conditioning vent, so the robbers don’t notice that it’s open. You might need to use it later.
‘What do we do?’ Kye whispers.
‘They won’t hurt us,’ you say. ‘Why would they? They’d get more jail time if they did, right?’
‘So . . . what do we do?’ Kye says again.
‘Nothing. We sit tight. The police will catch the robbers, or they’ll get away—either way, we’re fine. As long as we don’t make them mad.’
You sound more confident than you feel. But Kye isn’t fooled. He’s known you for a long time.
Miss Scarlet returns. ‘Come with me,’ she says.
Everyone s
tarts to get up.
‘No,’ she says, and points a finger at you. ‘Just you.’
So much for sitting tight. With one last frightened glance at Kye, you stand up and follow Miss Scarlet.
A hidden door is built into the wall next to the counter. The guy with the ring, Mr Signet, has opened it from the other side. Miss Scarlet pushes you through the doorway into the room beyond.
This is the part that customers aren’t supposed to see. A table is littered with receipts, business cards and empty coffee mugs. Someone has scribbled a message on a sticky note: New code is 137. Don’t forget!
No sign of the staff.
A trolley is parked crookedly in the corner, overflowing with bundles of cash wrapped in rubber bands.
The robbers ignore the cash completely. They also ignore the door marked PANIC ROOM. That must be where the staff escaped to.
Miss Scarlet leads you over to the telephone—an old-fashioned plastic landline with a cord. ‘When the police call,’ she says, ‘tell them no-one has been harmed, and no-one will be harmed, so long as the police stay away. We will be out of here in ten minutes. We’ll take one hostage with us. The hostage will be released once we’ve reached a safe location.’
This is a lot to take in. ‘Why don’t you talk to them?’ you ask.
‘Don’t ask questions,’ Miss Scarlet says. Perhaps she thinks they’ll recognise her voice.
Mr Signet leans over to her. ‘I can’t get the vault open,’ he says.
‘There’s a key in the manager’s desk.’
‘I got it already.’ Mr Signet holds up a long key. ‘But there’s a keypad as well, and the combination you gave me didn’t work.’
‘Try it again,’ Miss Scarlet says.
Mr Signet walks over to a massive steel door set in a concrete wall and locked with dozens of electronic bolts. He inserts the key into an invisible hole and punches numbers into a keypad below. The keypad beeps angrily.
‘They must have changed the combination,’ he said. ‘If I get it wrong once more, it will lock us out for twelve hours.’
Miss Scarlet thinks for a moment, and then turns back to you.
