All of a sudden, Mrs. Rawls’s anxious voice made everyone look. Drake had finished with Chester and was about to give his parents their shots.
“No! I won’t let my husband and son have any part in this!” she exploded. Chester and Mr. Rawls were standing on either side of her as she remonstrated with Drake. “Hasn’t my family done enough for you already?”
“Dissent in the ranks,” Danforth commented. “Doesn’t bode well, either.”
As directed by Danforth, Will began to cut a roll of khaki material into strips, which he wrapped around each of the Geiger counters before stacking them in a crate. The Geiger counters appeared to be the same as the ones Will had seen left at various points around the Complex — rather battered, with chipped gray enamel casings. The only difference he could spot in the ones he was packing up was that some type of stubby antenna had been added to them, and the analog dials had been replaced with modern LED displays. But Will really didn’t feel like speaking to the Professor to find out what they were going to be used for.
The heated discussion with Drake came to an end, with Mr. Rawls and his wife leaving the Hub. Will saw Chester heading over to him.
“That was embarrassing,” his friend said.
“What’s the matter?” Will asked.
“Mum doesn’t want Dad or me to be put in danger again. She’s a bit strung out by everything at the moment,” Chester replied. “So Dad and I are still coming, but Drake’s promised we’ll only be there in a support role. No front-line stuff. And Mum’s stopping here with . . .” He didn’t go as far as to mention Danforth’s name, but the Professor was too engrossed in his laptop anyway to hear.
“Oh,” Will said. He’d been counting on his friend being with him when they faced whatever they were going to face in London.
Chester leaned toward Will and whispered into his ear. “Don’t worry, though, Will. I’m not about to wimp out after all we’ve been through together.”
EVERYONE HAD BEEN ordered to report with their weapons and equipment to the area by the twin guardrooms at the far end of the entrance tunnel.
This was it. The moment they were all leaving.
Drake had given everybody white parkas with fur-lined hoods, and thick trousers of the same color. Although the clothes were a little bulky to move around in, he said they’d be grateful for the insulation they provided when they went outside.
As Will looked at everyone in these white combats, he saw their vacant expressions and how fidgety they were. He knew precisely what they were feeling. They were trying to hide their fear.
In the relative safety of the underground Complex, the threat posed by the Styx Phase felt so far away. Like some nightmare that might fade from memory if one stopped dwelling on it.
Why us? Why can’t someone else deal with it? Will asked himself. There must be somebody else out there who knew what was going on, somebody better placed to fight it.
Given the choice, Will knew that he would simply turn around and just march back down the long tunnel again. The Complex might be very far from the real world, but it had been the closest thing to home that he’d known in a long time.
But then he looked again and noticed what lay behind Drake’s and Eddie’s expressions. Their eyes spoke of duty and quiet determination and doing what had to be done. Will told himself that he should try to emulate these men and draw strength from them. He’d been so immersed in his thoughts that he hadn’t heard Drake speaking to him.
“Have you got your earplugs?” Drake asked for the second time.
Will nodded.
From his mobility scooter, Sergeant Finch was helping Drake to give each of them a detailed equipment check before they were allowed to pass up the slope and into the darkness of the entrance chamber. Will had emptied his Bergen and arranged the contents neatly on the floor next to his belt kit and Sten submachine gun. Drake now praised him.
“Perfect turnout,” he said. “We’ll make a soldier of you yet.”
“One last thing — comms check,” Sergeant Finch reminded Drake as he squinted at the list on his beloved clipboard while a cat slept on his lap.
Drake put his hand to his headset. “Testing — one — two — three,” he whispered.
“Got you loud and clear,” Will confirmed.
“Good, kid, but now turn it off to conserve the juice. And that’s you done.” Drake turned to Chester and began the process with him. Will repacked his Bergen but held back for his friend, who was clearly embarrassed because his mother seemed reluctant to let go of him.
Will’s heart went out to her as she clung to her son, speaking softly to him. Against all odds the Rawls family had been reunited, and it felt wrong that Chester and his father were about to be separated from Mrs. Rawls again.
Will threw a glance at his own mother as she stood not looking at anyone, in some sort of ethereal detachment. Will and Mrs. Burrows hardly constituted a family any longer. They were more like fellow combatants.
Then Chester was coming toward him. “Poor old Mum. She really doesn’t want us to go,” his friend confided in a low voice. The boys entered the chamber together, finding that Parry was already in position beside the sliding exit panel.
“Sweeney’s coming with us, isn’t he?” Will said to Parry, realizing that he hadn’t spotted him by the guardrooms.
“He’s watching the crates outside,” Parry replied. “And before you ask, Wilkie’s not part of the detail, either. He’s . . .” Parry simply trailed off as he looked at the dial of his luminous watch.
Before long, everyone was packed in the chamber. Shoulder to shoulder in the enclosed space and laden down with their weapons and heavy Bergens, they were getting hotter and hotter in their Arctic Issue uniforms.
Parry’s radio suddenly crackled into life. “Five clicks on a north by northwest flight line,” it announced. “Acknowledge. Over.”
Flight line, Will thought, wishing he could catch Chester’s eye, but it was impossible in the darkness. Nobody had been told how they’d be making the journey to London. Drake had said it was on a need-to-know basis.
“Acknowledged,” Parry replied into the radio. “The LZ will be painted. Over and out.” As he hooked his radio back on his webbing belt, he must have sensed that both boys were bursting to know what his exchange had been about. “These days we don’t use visible light to mark landing zones, but infrared beacons,” he explained. “The pilot can see it a mile off through his dropdown.”
“Right,” Will replied, as if he understood exactly what Parry had said, which he didn’t. But at least he now knew they’d be flying down south.
“It’s time,” Parry said to everyone. “I know you’re all weighed down with kit, but you must keep up with the Colonel as he leads the way to the LZ. Our window is very tight, and we can’t afford to be late.”
Parry slid the hatch open and the boys shuffled aside to allow the Colonel to slip past and outside. Then they all followed into the whirling flurries of snow.
“Jeez, it’s freezing!” Chester exclaimed as the cold air filled his lungs.
They moved quickly, one following the other, through the gate in the chain-link fence and then downhill, their boots thudding on the frosted ground as they jogged along.
Ahead of Will were Chester and the Colonel. Directly behind him came Parry, then he could make out the vague forms of the rest of the party: Mr. Rawls, Eddie and Elliott, Stephanie, Mrs. Burrows and, last of all, Drake.
A gale was sweeping up the mountainside and whistling through the overhead electrical lines as they passed beneath them. There was barely any moonlight due to the thick cloud cover, so Will found it impossible to make out anything much ahead. He could see Mr. Rawls was struggling to keep up, and began to wonder how far they still had to go. Were they heading toward the valley floor itself? But some twenty minutes later
the ground leveled out, and the Colonel began to slow. Will saw that Sweeney was crouched beside a number of crates that contained the mobile detectors he’d helped to pack.
“Stay put,” Parry ordered. Then he and Drake moved off. Standing some forty feet apart, they held up devices that resembled flashlights, although they gave off no discernible light.
Everyone was looking up when there was a sound as if the sky had fallen in. It was so tumultuous and unexpected, it was impossible not to duck.
The helicopter had been flying so low that there’d been no warning whatsoever as it appeared directly over them. As the immense downthrust from its powerful rotors whisked the snow blizzard aside like confetti, the massive piece of war machinery hovering no more than forty feet above their heads was quite terrifying.
As it taxied into position between Parry and Drake and began to descend, it tipped back. It maintained an angle of forty-five degrees and the moment the wheels at the rear of the fuselage touched down, a ramp swung open between them. Over the sound of the helicopter’s engine, Parry and Drake were yelling at everyone to get on board. There were subdued red lights marking the edges of the ramp to guide them, and as Will climbed it, he glimpsed army insignia on the fuselage. Drake, Sweeney, and the Colonel hauled the crates up the ramp and then it thudded shut, and they were airborne.
Will took the place beside Chester and strapped himself in. With seats down both sides, the interior was easily twice the size of a train car, but there was no sign of the crew. Will and Chester watched as Parry moved to the front of the helicopter. The boys caught a momentary glimpse of the two pilots bathed in the green glow of their instrumentation, before the door to the cockpit closed again.
Seeing their interest, Drake came over and leaned between them, speaking loudly so they could hear. “So what do you think of our ride?”
“Wild!” Chester replied.
“What type is it?” Will shouted.
“It’s a Chinook from No. 27 Squadron on its way back to Hampshire. Dad called in a few favors and managed to hitch us a lift. Of course, our presence is completely unofficial, and there’ll be no record of us being picked up on the flight log.”
Will and Chester nodded.
Drake gestured toward the window behind the boys, and they both swiveled around to look through it. There were one or two tiny points of light glimmering like stars in the distance, but otherwise there were just eddies of snow twisting into the darkness. “Keep buckled up as it’s going to be a bumpy flight. We’re tree-hugging all the way to avoid radar as much as we can,” he told them.
“Yeah, we’re really shifting it,” Will said excitedly as they zipped over an illuminated stretch of road.
But as Drake went back to his seat, Will’s initial enthusiasm quickly evaporated. The beat of the engines and sudden changes in altitude brought back memories of the last helicopter flight he’d been on.
Although it was difficult to tell in the dim light, Will was certain that he caught both Elliott and Colonel Bismarck looking at him. He wondered if they were also thinking about the journey they’d taken together in the inner world. It was shortly after Dr. Burrows had been gunned down by one of the Rebeccas, and Will had been so beside himself with rage and grief, he’d had to be strong-armed onto the aircraft by two New Germanian soldiers.
And then, to make matters worse, Will had proceeded to blame Elliott for his father’s death. He could see the glint of her eyes as she sat opposite him in the helicopter, and he felt so ashamed of his behavior. But more than this, he couldn’t stop thinking about his father’s violent end on the sun-soaked pyramid.
He was still lost in these thoughts when Chester poked him in the ribs, a big grin on his face as he gave the thumbs-up. Will could only manage a weak smile in response. But at least someone was enjoying the flight.
Will wasn’t sure if he’d nodded off, but it seemed no time at all before the engines changed in pitch. Then he glimpsed many more lights through the windows as they reduced altitude. Before he knew it, there was a jarring bump and the helicopter had touched down.
Parry and Drake were there, shouting at everyone to disembark over the sound of the rotors, which were still turning. The crates were quickly off-loaded, and in less than a minute, the helicopter lifted off again.
Will’s ears rang in the silence. They’d been dropped in a field where the snow was coming down even heavier than ever, and there was nothing visible around them.
Then, from a far corner, a single pair of headlights flicked on for an instant. Parry signaled back with his flashlight, and suddenly multiple lights raked across the field.
The vehicles began to approach, one at a time. The first was a camper van, followed by a Land Rover, then a Volvo estate and a whole succession of rather nondescript cars. Parry spoke to each driver as Drake and Sweeney loaded a crate into the back. Then the vehicles continued on, their wheels churning the snow as they went.
As the last of them disappeared into the night, Parry spoke to Eddie, who was waiting beside a single remaining crate of detectors. “This is where we part company. Good hunting.”
Eddie gave him a nod in response, then looked at Elliott. “Do you want to come with me?”
Elliott paused, throwing a half glance at Will through the steady fall of snowflakes. “OK,” she replied casually.
Will’s jaw dropped; he hadn’t expected for one second that she’d accept the invitation. He felt betrayed and abandoned by Elliott and, although he would never have admitted it to himself, a little jealous of her newly established relationship with her father. And he realized how much he relied on her being at his side, just as he did with Chester.
Parry struck out for the edge of the field, but Will didn’t move. Drake nudged him in a friendly way with his arm. “It’s all right, old mate; before you know it, she’ll be back with us again,” he assured him.
“Um, right . . . yes,” Will mumbled, realizing how obvious his feelings must have been. He hunched forward, pretending to cough so he had an excuse not to speak to Drake as he began to walk beside him.
Battling the blizzard as they went, everyone followed Parry through several fields until they came to a fenced-off area. Here he opened a gate. On the other side was a raised, snow-covered mound the size of several tennis courts. Will tried to make out where they were, but there wasn’t time as Parry led them briskly around the edge of the mound, then down some ice-crusted steps and through a door.
They were grateful to be out of the freezing wind and snow, and they filed after Parry, descending several more flights of basic concrete steps. Then they came to a battered metal door with a sign that proclaimed PUMP ROOM.
Chester went through before Will. “Look at this!” he whispered to his friend.
They were on a platform complete with a Tube train waiting in the tunnel. The platform wasn’t that different from the old-fashioned ones still in use in the London Underground; the walls were tiled, although it was impossible to see what color they were due to the thick crust of dirt and efflorescence on them. And the platform was littered with massive drums of armor cable and rotting wooden boxes filled with engineering components that were more rust than metal.
Will spotted a board with ALERT STATUS just visible at the top, beneath which were a pair of hooks, although there was nothing suspended on them. And as he scanned farther along the platform, he couldn’t see anything to indicate the name of the station.
“We must be near London?” he asked Parry.
“No, that’s a good thirty miles away. We’re in Essex.” Parry waved a hand at the roof. “We’re directly under Kelvedon Reservoir, and you won’t find anything about this place in any of the history books,” he said. “This was known as the First Circle of the defense infrastructure, so the government could decamp from the capital if things got sticky. When it was built, this train link originally r
an all the way to Westminster.”
“So that’s where we’re going?” Will said.
Parry shook his head. “The last mile’s been out of commission for years — due to flooding.”
Will had turned his attention to the train. There was illumination coming from inside the two cars directly in front of them, although their windows were almost opaque with dirt.
“It’s been maintained by a few of the Old Guard, more as a hobby than anything else,” Parry said, then swung around when a whistle rang out from the far end of the platform, and the train doors creaked open. “And there’s one of them now.” The man was too far away for Will to see him clearly as Parry waved to him and shouted, “Everyone in!”
The interior of the car consisted of a wooden slatted floor on which there were a few heaps of tattered tarpaulins.
“We have to keep the speed down because of the state of the track, so the journey takes about an hour. You should try to get some sleep,” Parry advised as everybody took their Bergens off and chose somewhere to put themselves.
Drake took over. “The golden rule is to catch some shut-eye whenever there’s an opportunity. You never know when you’ll get the chance again.”
“So we’ve had a helicopter, and now a train,” Chester said to Will. “What next?”
“Maybe a boat,” Will suggested, lying down with his head against his Bergen and trying to make himself comfortable. As the doors ground shut, he gave a large yawn. “Yes, a boat. We haven’t been in one of those since the Deeps.”
“No way. I hate boats,” Chester said in a disgruntled voice. “Boats and elevators and going underground.” He wiped the moisture from his face, then stifled a sneeze. “And being cold and wet. I hate that, too.”
“What about insects,” Will added. “Don’t forget insects.”
“The station’s coming up,” Drake shouted.
Will’s eyes flicked open, but it took him a moment to work out where he was as he saw Chester’s slack face not two feet away from him.
Spiral Page 20
