Blackout

by Peter Jay Black

  Jack strode towards his room. ‘Third time’s a charm,’ he muttered. At least he hoped it would be.

  In under an hour, Jack, Charlie and Wren were standing across the road from the kid’s apartment.

  Jack scoped out the area. There were six buildings, three each side of the road, facing one another. Their target was the red-brick one in the middle on the other side of the road. Facing it, on their side, was a white Georgian-style building.

  Charlie jogged up the pavement, stopped outside the white apartment, glanced around to make sure she wasn’t being watched, then bent down by the wall, as if doing up her shoelaces.

  After a moment, she sprang to her feet and hurried back to Jack and Wren.

  Jack stared at the red-brick building. No one was going in or out. The Phoenix was their best chance. Otherwise, they might be waiting all day.

  A couple of minutes later, a kid strode up to them. He was skinny, like Slink, and wore a hoodie.

  ‘Hey, Jack.’

  ‘Hi. How are you?’

  The kid sniffed and glanced around. ‘Not so bad.’ He looked at Charlie. ‘All right?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Wren,’ Jack said. ‘This is Raze.’

  Raze held his hand out. ‘Nice to meet ya.’

  Wren shook it. ‘You too.’ She let go and gave Jack a puzzled look.

  ‘Raze is an explosives expert,’ Jack said in a hushed voice. ‘We use his skills from time to time.’

  Raze slipped off his backpack and pulled out a rectangular object, the size of a shoebox, wrapped in brown paper.

  Jack took it from him. ‘Thanks.’

  Raze fished in his pocket and handed Charlie a remote key fob. It had a small antenna and a large red button. ‘Be careful with that,’ he said. ‘The trigger is sensitive.’

  ‘OK.’

  Raze gave her a crooked smile, then pulled his hood up and jogged away.

  Jack looked at Wren. ‘Right, see that white building with the pillars?’

  Wren nodded.

  ‘Charlie has drawn a cross on the pavement in blue chalk.’

  ‘By the wall,’ Charlie said.

  ‘Exactly,’ Jack said. ‘By the wall. Take this.’ He handed Wren the box. ‘Put it exactly on the cross, take two big steps back, then scream as loud as you can and look up. Understand?’

  Wren nodded.

  ‘Good.’ Jack glanced around. ‘Go.’ He squatted with Charlie between the bumpers of two parked cars.

  Charlie pulled a paintball sniper rifle from her bag, screwed in the barrel and hopper, and handed it to him. ‘Are you sure you don’t want me to do this?’

  ‘Nope.’ Jack rested his arm on one of the bumpers and looked through the scope. ‘This is all me.’

  ‘You’re really sure?’

  Jack looked at her. ‘What are you saying?’

  Charlie hesitated. ‘Well, Jack, the last two times –’

  ‘I’ve got this, all right?’

  Charlie held up her hands. ‘Fine. Whatever. Just saying.’ She looked at the red-brick building. ‘But, you know, if you –’

  ‘Shut up.’

  ‘OK, OK. God.’

  Jack watched Wren as she walked to the front wall of the white building and placed the box on the ground.

  She took two steps back and screamed.

  Wren then looked up and her eyes went wide.

  She screamed again. This time it was louder and sounded a lot more authentic, like real shock.

  Jack chuckled to himself – they’d not told Wren what was about to happen.

  ‘I still think we should’ve warned her,’ Charlie said.

  ‘Nah, that second scream was much more believable.’

  High above Wren’s head, holding on to a window ledge by nothing more than the tips of his fingers, was Slink. He had his hood up, hiding his face, and he swung his legs from side to side as if trying to find something to grip on to. ‘Help,’ he cried. ‘Please, please help me.’

  A middle-aged woman rushed over to Wren and said something to her. Wren pointed up and the woman’s gaze locked on Slink.

  The woman cupped a hand over her mouth.

  Jack focused on the glass front door of the red-brick building opposite. No one was coming out yet. ‘Come on,’ he muttered.

  More people gathered around Wren. Jack watched the surprise and horror register on their faces as they spotted Slink above them. Some gasped while others shouted for help. Yet others pressed mobile phones to their ears, no doubt calling the emergency services. A few people held their phones up, taking pictures.

  Slink continued to swing his legs back and forth as if he were panicking.

  As the minutes passed, even more people gathered and the commotion increased.

  Cars were stopping now.

  Jack looked through the scope on the paintball sniper rifle. ‘Bingo.’

  A man and woman in their twenties came out of the red-brick building.

  Jack kept his focus on the glass door as it started to close. He moved the cross hairs over the frame, down to the lock and squeezed the trigger.

  There was a blast of air. A paintball flew from the barrel, across the road, and missed the lock, splattering the wall inside the foyer.

  The door closed and the couple hurried over to the crowd of people, unaware of what had just happened.

  Jack swore and glanced at Charlie. ‘Don’t say it.’

  ‘I wasn’t going to. Wait,’ her eyes widened. ‘Jack.’

  Jack looked through the scope as an old lady walked into the foyer of the red-brick building and peered through the glass at the crowd.

  ‘Come outside,’ Jack muttered. ‘You can’t see properly from there. Come out. You know you want to.’

  The woman stood in the foyer for a full minute before she finally checked she had her keys on her and opened the door.

  ‘That’s right,’ Jack breathed.

  As soon as she stepped across the threshold, he took aim on the door lock, held his breath and squeezed the trigger.

  The modified paintball hit the lock dead on and exploded, covering it in a thick glutinous substance. The door went to close but because of the glue, it held open.

  Charlie’s homemade paintball recipe had worked.

  Jack handed her the gun and said into his microphone, ‘Wren, time for you to get back here.’

  Charlie folded the gun and slipped it into her bag.

  Wren squeezed through the crowd of onlookers and ran over to them. ‘Slink,’ she said, her voice shrill. ‘He’s –’

  ‘He’s fine.’ Charlie glared at Jack. ‘Slink knows what he’s doing.’

  A fire engine pulled up to the kerb and several men jumped out.

  ‘Time to get him out of there,’ Jack said.

  Charlie slipped the remote key fob from her pocket, took a breath and pressed the button.

  There was a loud pop as the box Wren had placed by the wall exploded. The crowd of onlookers jumped back and some of them instinctively ducked. But, instead of flying shrapnel or flame, a huge ball of smoke erupted skyward.

  In a couple of seconds, it enveloped Slink and continued to rise up the front of the white building.

  When the smoke cleared, Slink was gone.

  Wren stared, dumbfounded.

  ‘Come on,’ Charlie said, and they sprinted across the road and slipped into the red-brick building’s foyer.

  Jack pressed a finger to his ear. ‘Have you got an apartment number, Obi?’

  ‘Third floor. Flat twelve.’

  They headed to the stairs and as they climbed them, Charlie said to Jack, ‘I can’t believe that actually worked this time.’

  Jack, Charlie and Wren stood outside the door to apartment twelve.

  ‘Keep an eye out,’ Jack whispered. He slipped his backpack off, unzipped it and pulled out a flat camera mounted on a metal plate. A wire connected the camera to a portable LCD display, which he held in his other hand.

  Jack quietly slid the camer
a under the door and an image of the hallway on the other side appeared on the monitor.

  ‘Empty,’ he whispered. ‘No one in there.’

  Charlie motioned for Wren to keep guard, while she set to work on the lock with her picks.

  After a minute, the lock clicked and she stepped back.

  Jack slid the camera from under the door and returned it to his bag. He stood up, grabbed the door handle and silently stepped inside, with Charlie and Wren close behind.

  Charlie closed the door and they waited in the hallway, listening. The sound of a TV was coming from an open door to their right.

  Jack glanced back at the others, put a finger to his lips and crept up to it, his back close to the wall.

  He took a deep breath, then peered around the doorframe.

  The room beyond was a teenager’s bedroom. There was a single bed with black bed sheets. Posters hung on the wall – pictures of galaxies and space rockets. A TV sat on a dresser. A film was on. Jack recognised it as War of the Worlds. Alien spaceships were shooting laser weapons on a town, as people tried to run away.

  Against the wall was a desk. Under it was a computer with its lights blinking. On the desk was also a laptop and next to that were thirty or forty origami shapes made out of chewing gum wrappers. Jack frowned at them – there were various birds and animals. One of them even looked like a –

  There was a noise and Jack’s head snapped to the left. Opposite the bedroom was a lounge and he caught sight of a kid pulling back a set of curtains and opening the window.

  Jack ran into the room.

  The kid started to climb out of the window, but he yelled and fell back.

  Slink was outside, hanging upside down like a vampire bat. He grinned. ‘Hello, mate.’

  A minute later, the kid was sitting in an armchair, breathing heavily, sweat glistening on his forehead. He looked up at the four of them. ‘What do you want?’

  Jack folded his arms. ‘So you’re Hector.’

  He hesitated. ‘How do you know my name?’

  ‘Where’s the virus?’

  Hector looked uneasily between them all before saying to Jack, ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Achilles.’

  Hector’s eyes went wide. ‘Achilles? Serious? The Achilles who hacked the USKR bank?’

  Jack glanced at Charlie. ‘Maybe.’

  ‘That means . . .’ Hector looked between them all. ‘Are you the Urban Outlaws?’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Wren said, aghast.

  ‘You’re kinda famous.’

  ‘No we’re not,’ Jack said.

  ‘Yes you are. Everyone on the Cerberus forum knows about you.’ Hector had a look of awe on his face. ‘You blew up that quantum computer, didn’t you?’

  ‘Proteus,’ Slink said, lifting his chin.

  Jack scowled at him, then his narrowed eyes locked on Hector again. ‘Where’s the virus?’

  ‘What virus?’

  Slink stepped forward. ‘Want me to hang this bozo out of the window, Jack?’

  Hector didn’t flinch. ‘I’m not scared of heights.’

  ‘Oh, yeah?’ Slink took another step forward. ‘Guess you just ain’t been high enough yet.’

  Jack held up a hand.

  Slink scowled at Hector and stepped back again.

  Jack glanced around the apartment. ‘Where are your parents?’

  ‘Dad’s away,’ Hector said. ‘Won’t be back until next week. Mum’s dead.’

  ‘We know what you did. We know you broke into Bransgore power station.’

  Hector’s eyebrows rose. ‘I didn’t break in. There was already a hole in the fence.’ He looked at Charlie and for the first time, a slight grin twitched his lips. Hector’s eyes then moved to Slink and Wren. ‘I watched what you two did to that guard. That was some impressive stuff.’

  Slink nodded. ‘Yeah, I know.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Wren said, beaming at Hector.

  ‘That’s not the point,’ Jack said. ‘We know you’ve got the virus. You have no idea how powerful it is.’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ Hector said. ‘Why do you think I wanted it?’

  Jack was caught off guard by this statement. He took a moment to compose himself before asking, ‘How did you find out about it?’

  ‘The blackouts, of course.’

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘Well, I knew something had to be moving from power station to power station. It was obvious.’

  ‘Oh, really?’

  Hector shrugged. ‘Yeah. I figured it was probably a virus moving through their systems.’ He glanced round to the others again. ‘As I said – it was obvious.’

  Slink smiled and nudged Jack’s arm. ‘Obvious.’

  Jack remained tight-lipped. ‘You worked out it was a virus, so what then?’

  Hector shuffled in his chair. ‘I hacked into their systems and found it.’ His eyes glazed over and he stared at the wall. ‘It was amazing.’

  ‘I know,’ Jack said. ‘Get to the point.’

  ‘So,’ Hector said, seeming to snap out of his trance. ‘Knowing what the virus was capable of, I had to have it. I wanted to understand how it worked.’

  Jack sighed. He’d wanted the same thing – to see how the virus ticked, but they had to grab it first, before it got even more out of control. ‘What did you do next?’

  ‘I was trying to work out a way to remove it when the techies cut the line to the internet. I knew I had to go and break in, try to remove it directly, but you lot beat me to it.’

  Jack’s eyes wandered to the bedroom across the hall. The laptop on the desk had his USB stick in the side port.

  Charlie had spotted it too. She marched off to the bedroom and returned with them. She handed the stick to Jack.

  ‘Is the virus on here?’ he said.

  Hector shook his head.

  Jack frowned. ‘Where is it then?’

  Hector squeezed his eyes shut. ‘Gone.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Oh, that’s flipping brilliant,’ Slink shouted.

  Hector opened his eyes. ‘It slipped through my firewalls.’

  ‘Of course it did, you idiot. That’s what it does.’

  ‘Slink,’ Charlie hissed.

  ‘What?’ Slink threw his hands up and walked to the window.

  ‘I know where the virus went though,’ Hector said in a low voice. ‘And I’ve been working on a plan to get it back.’

  ‘Where is it?’ Jack said.

  ‘Look.’ Hector leant forward in the chair. ‘Let me join your gang.’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘I can help you,’ Hector said, looking around at all of them. ‘We can catch the virus together. I’d make a good Urban Outlaw. Come on, please?’

  Jack opened his mouth to answer, but his earpiece crackled.

  ‘Guys?’ It was Obi, and it sounded as though it was urgent.

  Jack turned away and pressed a finger to his ear. ‘Can’t it wait? We’re just about to find out where the virus has gone.’

  ‘You might want to look out of the window.’

  Jack hurried over and peered down. ‘Oh.’ A black SUV pulled up at the kerb. ‘No way.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Charlie joined him and when she saw what he was looking at, she gasped. ‘How the –’

  Benito Del Sarto’s henchman – Connor – climbed out of the driver’s side.

  Charlie said, ‘Why isn’t he in prison?’

  Connor had tried to kill the Outlaws on several occasions.

  The nightmare got worse – Monday, a man so big that he looked like he could pick up a sumo wrestler in each hand and not break into a sweat, stepped out of the back of the SUV. Last, Cloud, a smartly dressed woman got out the of front-passenger side.

  ‘This is not happening.’ Jack spun around. ‘We’ve got to get out of here.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Hector said.

  ‘Bad people,’ Charlie said. ‘Very bad people.’

  ‘What do they want?’


  ‘I’ll give you one guess.’ Jack stepped in front of him. ‘Last chance – where’s the virus?’

  Hector looked at the window. ‘I’m not telling you.’

  ‘What?’ Jack said, incredulous. ‘Yes, you are.’

  Hector’s eyes moved to him. ‘You say those people are here for the virus?’

  Jack nodded.

  ‘Then you’ve got to take me with you.’

  ‘We’re not recruiting,’ Jack said. ‘Tell us where it is or –’

  ‘Or what?’ Hector said.

  They glared at each other.

  Slink peered out of the window. ‘We haven’t got time for this.’

  ‘I’ll make a pact,’ Hector said in a calm voice. ‘Take me with you and I’ll tell you where the virus has gone.’

  Jack shook his head. ‘No deal.’

  ‘Jack.’ Charlie grabbed his arm. ‘We can’t leave him for Connor to find.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Slink said. ‘They might beat the virus’s location out of him.’

  Jack’s eyes didn’t move from Hector’s. ‘Where. Is. It?’

  Hector sat back in his chair and crossed his arms.

  ‘They’ll be here any moment,’ Slink said, his voice urgent. ‘Are we staying to fight them?’

  ‘No, we’re not,’ Charlie said. ‘Please, Jack, let’s go.’

  Jack hesitated, then he said to Hector through a clenched jaw, ‘OK. You’re coming with us, but if you try to run, we’ll –’

  ‘I won’t run.’ Hector stood up, grabbed a backpack from a table and held his hand out to Charlie. ‘Laptop, please.’

  She handed it to him and there was a knock at the front door.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Jack, Charlie, Slink and Wren sprinted down the hallway, following Hector into a cramped kitchen. He pulled up a blind, opened the window and scrambled out on to the fire escape.

  Jack motioned for Wren to go next.

  She climbed up and Hector helped her through.

  There was another knock, louder this time.

  ‘Go,’ Jack said to Slink.

  Slink jumped through the open window in one fluid movement.

  Jack gestured for Charlie to hurry up too.

  There was a loud bang as a heavy object rammed into the front door. Jack glanced down the hallway. He could guess what that object was – Monday’s shoulder or foot.