by Joe Craig
A subtle twist of his hips sent Jimmy powering towards the silhouette of one of the boats, directly above him. The rapid kick of his legs accelerated like a finely tuned motor. He stretched his arms out above his head again, with his hands linked into a wrecking ball.
THUD!
Jimmy’s fists punched into the belly of the first speedboat. But he didn’t stop. His momentum carried him upwards, as if he was jumping straight out of the water—except the speedboat was in the way. The laws of physics did the rest. The boat leapt off the surface of the river like a bucking rodeo bull, the outboard motor squealing as it churned against thin air. The six NJ7 agents inside were caught totally by surprise. Two of them were thrown straight up into the air. The others gripped the side of the boat, thinking it would save them. But the whole thing flipped over and tossed them into the water.
Jimmy saw the successive splashes of Secret Service agents hitting the surface, then the boat crashing upside-down next to them. He couldn’t stop himself smiling. He’d already plunged downwards again, without anybody seeing what had attacked.
The small fleet fanned out to cover a wider area and accelerated. Jimmy circled beneath them, waiting for the moment to strike again. There were now six fully manned attack boats still in the water, but within seconds they docked and the men disembarked.
Jimmy was impressed at how calmly they had taken the attack. It was obviously vital not to draw the attention of all the people on the bridge. Even the agents who’d been dumped into the water hadn’t let out a sound. The mission had hardly been disrupted.
Jimmy could feel his programming throbbing inside him, almost merging with the rhythm of the river’s currents. The same thing was happening inside him—his human self seemed to be shifting with the ebb and flow of his programming through his blood. The two were swirling together. Jimmy had no way of telling them apart, and at that moment had no desire to separate them either. He was functioning as a complete being —a totally efficient assassination unit.
He let his arms relax and floated up until he was just below the surface of the water. Now he circled again and watched. The shadows of the agents were diffracted in the water, making them look like pillars of black smoke. Jimmy waited until all the men had climbed over the low wall that separated the street from the river.
Even from under the water Jimmy could tell their body language was uncertain. Most of them were looking anxiously over the waves, studying them for the hidden menace. A few glanced towards the bridge, concerned about what the public had seen. For now the shelter of the trees along the river kept the NJ7 force out of sight of ordinary Londoners.
With an explosion of energy, Jimmy surged forwards. He glided just under the surface and thrust his head out of the water directly behind one of the boats. Before he could even cough up the water in his body and take a breath of air, he launched his attack.
He pushed himself up and planted his hands over the back end of the boat. If the agents saw him, they were too slow to react. With an almighty judder through his whole body, he flipped his legs up, out of the water and over his head. When he was completely vertical, his body jerked again. The core muscles in his stomach and along his spine were like blades on an iron propeller. His body circled over itself—but he didn’t let go of the back of the boat.
At the peak of Jimmy’s backflip, he lifted the speedboat out of the water and brought it with him. All he could see was a whirl of blackness, lit by the water spraying off his skin and hair. But he could feel the power in his arms making the boat feel like a heap of splinters. He landed squarely with both feet on top of the short wall, coughing and spluttering. He retched hard to bring up a lungful of black Thames water, and his first breath of air was like a new life. Yet he never stopped moving. He couldn’t—he was in the midst of the NJ7 attack force.
Jimmy’s arms were raised above his head, brandishing the biggest weapon he’d ever used—a speedboat. He brought it crashing down through the lower branches of the trees and swept it sideways, knocking three agents to the floor and sending three more hurrying backwards to avoid being crushed.
The other agents didn’t hesitate to draw their weapons—the ones that hadn’t been lost in the water. But Jimmy brought the boat back round in front of him, knocking any agent within three metres over the wall into the Thames. The others managed to fire off several rounds, but the bullets only pinged off the bottom of the speedboat. It was Jimmy’s shield, bulldozer and sword, all in one. He swung it round his head, tearing a hole in the foliage above him and scattering the NJ7 force.
But they weren’t defeated. Even while the agents were struggling against Jimmy’s might, he saw the calm determination on their faces. These were no ordinary soldiers—this was NJ7. They were trained using the same systems that were programmed into Jimmy’s blood. They knew all about him and had been warned what to expect if they ever came up against him.
The agents who had ended up in the water were climbing over the wall again now and joining the counter-attack. Even while Jimmy was hurling the speedboat around his head, he spotted the commanding glances flashing between the soldiers. Half of them peeled away and ran towards the building behind them—St Thomas’ hospital. They weren’t going to try to beat him, Jimmy realised. A few of them needed to hold him back for a few minutes, while the others continued their mission.
I can’t let them, Jimmy thought. His programming was already working on a solution. He threw the boat directly up into the air with a hard spin and dashed a few metres up the wall to a second boat. The first boat landed with a crash, its nose on top of the wall, its back end bobbing in the Thames. Jimmy powered up the second boat and sped out into the centre of the river.
Behind him, the NJ7 agents hesitated, not believing that Jimmy was giving up and running away. Jimmy was light-headed from breathing water for so long and with an unnatural glee in his chest he had to force back a laugh. He glanced over his shoulder. Agents wearing dripping combat gear and bemused expressions were wondering whether the fight was over. It’s just starting, thought Jimmy.
He wheeled the boat round to face the hospital again and accelerated. The engine roared into action. Jimmy willed it to full capacity. He was at the bank in seconds, but didn’t stop. The boat he’d left upturned at the edge of the river acted as the perfect ramp. Jimmy aimed for it now, the breath freezing in his throat. Was this even possible?
Jimmy’s boat hit the first with a crunch and lurched into the air. He skimmed the top of the short wall and sailed over the street. On either side, NJ7 agents dived out of the way. Jimmy scythed through them, leaning to his right to direct the boat towards his target: the entrance of the hospital.
The boat twisted on to its side and landed with a harsh bounce. Jimmy held on. The edge of the boat scraped across the pavement then smashed through the doors of the hospital. Jimmy instinctively threw his arms up around his face to protect himself from the flying glass. The boat screeched across the lobby of the hospital and crashed through the reception desk, sending papers flying everywhere. It finally slammed into the snack machine by the bank of lifts in an explosion of coins and crisps.
But NJ7 agents were already pounding up the stairs to find Ian Coates—and kill him.
20 THE MAKING OF A MONSTER
Eva crouched in the darkness below the window. A soft glow was creeping through the slats of the Venetian blinds. It picked out Mitchell’s eyes, which glowed like a tiger’s. He was crouched right next to her, so close she could feel his body rise and fall with his breathing. His head was steady, directed towards the door. He was ready to pounce at the first sign of movement.
“Thank you…” rasped Ian Coates.
“Quiet,” Mitchell insisted in a whisper. “We have to listen for how many are coming and when.”
He must have felt Eva trembling next to him, because he leaned towards her and added, “Stay here. Don’t move unless I tell you to.” His voice was soft and surprisingly deep. Eva felt the heat of his breath on her ear
and didn’t know whether she felt reassured or more afraid.
“Thank you for coming for me…” Coates said again. His voice was thin and so quiet that Eva could hardly make out what he was saying. He murmured something else, but it quickly faded out. Eva wasn’t sure about it, but one word she picked out was “Georgie”. Had the Prime Minister just addressed her as his daughter by mistake?
The wait stretched out for what seemed like hours. We should have tried to escape, Eva thought. The sound of her breathing merged with Mitchell’s. It was all she could hear now, but she had to trust that Mitchell was sensing something more—the vibrations of other movement through the building, perhaps even the mechanism of the lift telling him whether anybody was close to the top floor. It had quickly dawned on both of them that the patients in the rest of this wing of the hospital must have been hastily moved elsewhere.
They’d both heard some kind of struggle going on at street level, but it had been hard to work out what was going on. All Eva knew was that dozens of NJ7 agents had arrived on speedboats, heading for this hospital room. Where were they?
“Is anybody—” Eva began, but Mitchell cut her off.
“Shh!” he placed a hand on hers. She was startled by how cool his fingers were. “Someone’s—”
The click of the door handle cut him off. It triggered Mitchell’s reactions. He shot across the room in a single leap, just as the door burst open. Eva flinched, knowing she was about to be caught up in bloody hand-to-hand combat. She cowered in the corner, unable to watch. The conflict of her thoughts was as violent as the coming battle: she finally had to admit that a part of her genuinely cared whether Mitchell would be hurt. Why? she asked herself in anguish. He’s my enemy!
The silence of the ward seeped into her brain. Where were the sounds of the fight? She forced herself to turn back to the door. Mitchell had pulled back and was frozen in the centre of the room. Eva looked past him and saw the silhouette of another boy framed in the doorway, dripping wet and pouring the last crumbs of a packet of crisps down his throat: Jimmy.
“Get away from the Prime Minister,” Jimmy snarled.
“We’re here to save him,” Mitchell barked back. “Not to kill him.”
Jimmy stepped cautiously into the ward and pushed the door shut behind him. The light creeping through the Venetian blinds cast horizontal bars across his face in a dim orange. Water pooled at his feet and his knuckles were bleeding from his battles with the NJ7 forces, whose unconscious bodies now littered the whole building.
“I know what’s going on,” he said firmly, scrunching his crisp packet into his pocket. “Miss Bennett’s taking over the country. She wants to get rid of…” He jerked his thumb towards Ian Coates, but couldn’t unlock the muscles in his neck to look at the man. “She sent you with a team to finish the job.”
“Think about it,” Mitchell replied immediately. “If she’d sent me, the job would be finished already. Nobody else would be necessary.” His shoulders rose slightly, the bulge of his deltoids testing the fabric of his T-shirt.
Jimmy edged forwards. He could feel the tension in his hands and the force of his programming surging through to the very tips of his fingers. He was ready to strike. Not yet, he pleaded with himself. “Do I look convinced?” he asked, forcing the words out of his clenched jaw.
“It’s true, Jimmy.” Eva jumped up to stand by Mitchell. The interruption took the sting out of Jimmy’s aggression and Mitchell must have noticed it. He glanced suspiciously at Eva, then back at Jimmy.
“Why do you believe her more than me?” he asked bitterly. “She’s the one who betrayed you.”
“And you’re the one who’s usually trying to ram your fist through my face,” Jimmy snapped. The two boys took a half-step towards each other.
“Jimmy!” Ian Coates’ hoarse whisper sliced through Jimmy’s brain. His body didn’t know whether to melt with joy or explode with rage. It was the sound of the man who had brought him up, joked with him, comforted him—then betrayed him, denied he was his son and issued the order to kill him.
A thousand thoughts crashed through Jimmy’s head, but he couldn’t make any of them out clearly. He found himself drawn towards his father’s bed. The man’s face was horribly disfigured, the skin scarred and pale, but his lips were drawn in a weak smile. The sight of it made Jimmy feel sick.
“You…” Jimmy rasped, his own voice failing. “How could you…?”
“What’s going on, Jimmy?” Ian Coates asked at last, shifting in his bed. “Did you say that Miss Bennett is taking over the country?”
Jimmy couldn’t speak. He was mesmerised by his father’s face. This could have been a different man from the one he’d grown up with— far, far older. Then there was the strange expression: a half smile that grew in confidence with every second.
“Do you feel better…sir?” asked Mitchell.
Ian Coates was breathing heavily, but the colour was returning to his cheeks. He nodded slowly, without taking his eyes off Jimmy.
Suddenly, Jimmy lurched forwards. The anger in his chest bubbled over, fuelled by the overwhelming urge for violence. He landed with his knee on Ian Coates’ chest and slammed one hand up into the man’s chin to hold his head back. With his other hand, Jimmy slapped away the man’s resistance. “I could snap your neck in an instant,” Jimmy seethed.
Mitchell launched into action. Jimmy was aware of the shifting shadows as the other boy dived towards him, but Jimmy was frozen. He couldn’t get out of the way and he couldn’t complete his attack. He stared into his father’s eyes for that split-second before Mitchell barrelled into him. Something stopped him moving, as if his muscles were locked in place—was it his programming or his human conscience?
Mitchell slammed into Jimmy with the force of a typhoon. They both tumbled off the bed and crashed to the floor. Only now did Jimmy’s limbs unlock, just in time to struggle free of Mitchell’s hold and push himself to his feet. The two boys held themselves opposite each other, neither one moving except for their eyes, which took in every twitch of every muscle of their opponent, ready to strike back at the first sign of counter-attack.
“So neither of you is here to kill me,” said Ian Coates in a strangled whisper.
“I serve my country,” said Mitchell quickly, almost automatically. He stared into Jimmy’s face, but confusion flickered through his body. After the longest second of Jimmy’s life, Mitchell burst into action again, aiming a kick at the side of Jimmy’s head. Jimmy ducked to the side, grabbed Mitchell’s ankle with both hands and used it like a monkey bar to swing himself under the Prime Minister’s bed. He slid across the floor and came out on the other side of the bed, then jumped up and twisted to face his opponent, with the Prime Minister lying between them.
“Enough,” Ian Coates ordered. Mitchell and Jimmy both froze.
“But…but…” Mitchell stammered.
“He’s not your target,” Coates insisted. “For now. If we want to stop Miss Bennett, we’ll have to work together. All of us. I need your help and you need me alive.”
Mitchell dropped his eyes to the floor like a bewildered dog.
“It’s OK, Mitchell,” Coates explained. “Jimmy knows that if he kills me, he may as well be working for NJ7. Miss Bennett would win. That’s right, isn’t it, Jimmy?”
Jimmy nodded cautiously, but he knew it wasn’t that simple. His human feelings were flooded with blood lust. He wanted to attack. Was it his programming holding him back? Did he have some kind of built-in respect for the Prime Minister that was stronger than his desire for revenge or for justice?
“And if Miss Bennett wins,” Ian Coates went on, gradually regaining some energy, “then the person who was really behind the attack on the tower block will be free to bring havoc and destruction to the whole of Britain.” He looked quickly at Mitchell, who seemed to flinch. “We don’t want that, do we, Mitchell?”
Mitchell didn’t answer.
“You’ve done terrible things,” Jimmy whispered, for
cing himself not to look at his father in case it triggered another attack.
“Believe me, Jimmy,” replied Ian Coates. “That video of me ordering the bombing of the tower block—it was a fake.” His words rushed out, almost breathlessly. “Miss Bennett—she’s the one behind these horrors. She’s the one really running the country. And now she wants to take over for good. We can’t let her!”
Something deep in Jimmy’s brain noticed the expression on Mitchell’s face, as if he was going to say something, but stopped himself. Then Jimmy saw the other boy glance at Eva, who had pressed herself back against the window, her face in her hands. Jimmy was trembling, turmoil churning up his blood.
“I meant,” he whispered, “you’ve done terrible things to me.”
He felt the sting of tears gathering in his eyes, but dropped his gaze to the floor to hide them. That’s when he caught another glimpse of the growing blue stains around the tips of his fingers and he couldn’t hold back the tears any more. For a moment there was silence.
“I’m not a bad man, Jimmy,” said Ian Coates softly. “You have to believe that.”
“Prove it,” Jimmy growled.
There was no answer, until Eva rushed forwards and placed a hand on Jimmy’s shoulder. “We have to get him out of here, Jimmy,” she pleaded. “Miss Bennett isn’t going to give up. She’ll send more forces to kill him, then she’ll take over. And the public is on her side. Look.” She pulled him over to the window and pulled apart two slats of the blind.
Jimmy squinted out at the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben and the Thames. Then he saw Westminster Bridge, more packed than ever with people bustling in both directions. He couldn’t hear what they were shouting, and they were too far away for him to make out their expressions, but some of them were punching the air in a regular beat. Some of them simply had their fists raised.
