“Does he treat you well?” he said to her.
He wasn't sure whether he expected an answer or not but the woman smiled. “Oh yes,” she said. “Very well.”
Then she closed the door and John was left by himself to wonder whether he had been on a wild goose-chase for the last forty-eight hours or whether he had just had the wool pulled over his eyes. Either way his options were limited to just one. He climbed on his bike and started the engine. The loose stone ground crunched beneath his wheels.
15
Marla was waiting for him in the garage. She had her arms wrapped around herself, it didn't look like she'd moved since he left.
He climbed off his bike and took off his helmet. She came running over to him and in the moment before she buried her face in his shoulder he could see that she had been crying.
“I didn't think you were coming back,” she sobbed.
If there had ever been a moment to tell her how he felt about her it was then but he had other things on his mind. He hugged her briefly and when he let go she followed him.
*
“Do you think he was he telling the truth?” she said.
They were in his office and he had told her what Sanctuary had told him. He had given her one of his jumpers to wear and though it came up big he had to admit it looked a damn lot better than her than it did on him.
“I don't know,” he said. Something was still niggling at him but he couldn't work out what. “Timothy?”
“Yes sir?”
“Do you think that Sanctuary was telling the truth?”
“His pulse rate and blood pressure indicated that he believed what he was saying. Mr Ranulph, however, had an elevated pulse and skin moisture levels which would indicate concealment.”
“Why didn't you say something?” said John, aware that he was in serious danger of getting into an argument with a computer program.
“You didn't ask sir.”
“You're supposed to inform me of any relevant data.”
“Your conversation was with Mr Sanctuary. The well being of his guest did not register as relevant. I can modify the parameters for future encounters.”
John sighed. “Just give me what you can on Ranulph. Something relevant,” he added.
Marla got up from the sofa where she had been curled like a cat. She walked over to him, her bare feet padding on the carpet. “Why don't you come to bed,” she said.
He never needed much encouragement to go to bed with Marla Springer and this case was starting to get to him. He had driven home with the hope that he would be able to close the book on it and get back to shooting bad guys for money. Now it seemed as wide open as it had ever been: what the hell was Rudolph Ranulph hiding?
He stood up and took her hand. She led him down the first set of stairs into his bedroom. It was plain to say the least; a double bed and a wardrobe. The walls were painted white.
“This place could use a woman's touch,” she said as she lowered herself onto the bed and pulled him down on top of her.
John wondered if she had just asked if she could moved in. Then he wondered what she was doing with her hand and once he found out he didn't wonder about anything else.
16
John couldn't sleep. He lay in bed for a couple of hours after Marla had dropped off but eventually he decided that if he stayed there tossing and turning he would wake her. So he got out of bed, put on some trousers and went back to his office.
“Is everything okay sir?” said Timothy as he entered.
“Give me everything you've got on Rudolph Ranulph.”
“Yes sir,” said Timothy.
A few moments later he was sitting at his desk with his computer open, reading a profile of the man with the secret.
Rudolph Ranulph was a crook. According to his records he imported drugs. He was the head of a small time criminal empire and ran protection rackets on a few businesses in the area. There had been arrests for violent attacks but never for anything big.
Next he checked through Gregory Sanctuary's files. John believed what he had said about his wife and the clones but he was running out of places to look. Sanctuary had worked at Coblance labs since he'd left school and worked his way up from research. According to the timing he had met Sandra at the lab.
John flicked back over to Ranulph's details: he had only married Sabrina two years ago and before then it didn't look like he and Sanctuary had crossed paths at all.
He wondered again whether Sandra and Sabrina had known what they were.
John continued to sift through increasingly fragmented records about the two men. For completeness he brought up files on Sandra and Sabrina but they shed no more light on the situation.
Hours seemed to pass. He rubbed his eyes and thought that he might go back downstairs and slip into bed beside Marla. If he tried counting down from one-thousand he might be able to get to sleep.
Instead he picked up a pulse gun and put on his jacket. Ranulph was up to something and he wasn't going to be able to rest until he figured out what it was.
17
The gate at Ranulph's house was open and there was a light on in the garage. John stood in the shadows next to his bike and waited. He could hear the sound of a car engine and over that muttered voices.
A few minutes later the Humvee drove out and stopped on the road. Rudolph Ranulph got out of the car, closed the gate and then drove away.
John gave him a few hundred metres head-start and then climbed on his bike to follow. He had slipped a tracking device onto the bottom of the car when he had seen it at Sanctuary's house. Now his contact lens displayed translucent arrows showing him which way the car was going.
He didn't have any idea what Ranulph was up to but he knew it couldn't be good.
It was the middle of the night and except for a few people staggering home drunk the streets were empty. John kept his distance from the Humvee knowing that it would be easy for Ranulph to spot him and also that he didn't have to worry about losing track of him.
They were heading towards Hanlow but before they hit the motorway Ranulph turned off down a side road. A sign indicated he was heading for Southland Dock.
“Tim,” said John, “what's at Southland Dock?”
“Boats sir,” said Timothy. He was a computer AI whose voice was modelled on Timothy Bright, the founder if the BHI. He was supposedly incapable of feeling emotions but sometimes John wasn't so sure. If he didn't know any better he would have said Timothy was in a bad mood.
“I know that,” he said. There were no streetlights along the winding country road so John switched off the bikes lights and trusted in his enhanced eyes to see. “What sort of boats?”
“Commercial freight,” said Timothy. “Although there is a small area for canal boats.”
Around another corner he came to a gate. It was closed and Ranulph was already on the other side. John stopped his bike by the side of the road and pulled a few branches over it.
The gate had a mechanical number pad which, of course, John didn't know the number of. It was easily twenty metres high. Enough to keep most people out but John was not most people.
Thanks to the enhancements he had received at BHI he could jump higher than most people. Not quite twenty metres but he was strong too.
He jumped up and seemed to float. When he felt that he was nearing the top of the arc he grabbed hold of the metal rails. He looked down; he'd made it about ten metres. He still had ten metres to go though and Ranulph was still in his car and getting further away. He scrambled up the rest of the fence and dropped down with barely a sound on the other side.
He was strong but he wouldn't have been able to get his bike over. He started to run and his strength helped him there too. He was able to maintain a flat out sprint for minutes rather than seconds and by the time he reached the second gate he could see the Humvee again.
“Sir, the car engine has been switched off,” said Timothy.
“Thanks,” said John. Despite knowing t
hat Timothy was incapable of holding a grudge he found himself being extra polite.
The second gate was smaller and he almost jumped it in one go. At the top of it he looked down across the dock and saw dozens of little canal boats and two men hurrying along the pier. One of them was Ranulph, he had no doubt. The other was reluctantly following and his grotesquely swollen head convinced John that it was Stafford.
He dropped down on the other side of the fence and followed the path down hill and onto the pier. It bobbed and wobbled as he hurried along it. Even with his training it was impossible to keep completely silent. Fortunately there were voices and music coming from several of the canal boats which effectively disguised any noise he was making.
The pier spread out from the land like a spiders web or, with its numerous dead-ends and loops, like a maze. John no longer had the benefit of a tracking device so he had to keep the two dark figures in sight.
He found himself wanting to believe that Sanctuary was a good man and that he had told Ranulph to release Stafford. The fact that Ranulph was taking Stafford somewhere against his will was just further confirmation that, whatever was going on here, he was the one behind it.
Further along the pier the boats got larger. First there were motorboats that looked like they probably belonged to rich folk who lived in Hanlow. They got bigger and more impressive and when Ranulph finally stopped it was beside a giant three story behemoth that must have belonged to Sanctuary.
Still John found himself unwilling to believe that Sanctuary was aware of what his brother in-law was doing. He watched from a few metres away as Ranulph dragged Stafford onto the boat and disappeared inside. Then he followed.
On the side of the boat was written 'The Lady Sandra.'
He could already feel the motor grinding beneath his feet. It made the boat shake.
John dived behind a blue plastic container and watched as a clone appeared and removed the rope that was tying the boat to the pier. She had her hair cut short like a boy but it did nothing to hide her beauty. When she was done she disappeared back around the corner she had come from and the boat started to move.
A light was switched on inside and he could hear voices. He tried to make out what was being said but it sounded like a foreign language and he didn't dare make enough noise to ask Timothy to translate.
He remained hidden behind the box and watched as the other boats became dots in the distance. They passed through a grassy mouth that led out onto the river. The Lady Sandra barely fit through the gap.
Once they were on the open river the boat began to pick up speed and once it was steady John stood up.
“How many bodies on the boat?” he whispered to Timothy.
“Fifty-three,” came the reply.
He was surprised. It was a big boat but so far he'd only seen three people. It seemed impossible that a further fifty were somewhere on board.
“Sir,” said Timothy. “It may interest you to know that we are travelling due-east.”
He wasn't sure why that would interest him but Timothy undoubtably had his reasons for saying so.
“At our current speed we will reach Lunden in one-hour and shortly after that the open sea.”
What was Ranulph planning, he wondered. Was he making an escape or did he have something else in mind? John took out his pulse gun, made sure that it was charged, and then set off to find out.
The boat gently rocked beneath his feet as he made his way towards the door. The voices grew louder but no more distinct.
Inside it was warm and a welcome relief from the cool air blowing off the river. John opened the first door on his right, away from the light and voices and into the depths of the boat.
18
If the boat had seemed big from the outside it was nothing compared to what he found within. A seemingly endless run of corridors and steps took him down into darkness.
The voices faded and vanished above him. Even his enhanced eyes struggled to make out more than vague shapes which he realised meant it had to be close to complete darkness. A cat wouldn't even be able to see down there.
He could no longer hear the water hitting the side of the boat which presumably meant he was now below the river. He tried not to think about how he was going to get away. As long as he did what he had to do before they reached the open sea he supposed he would be able to swim to shore.
He turned another corner and down three steps.
“Sir?” said Timothy. The sound of his voice was far too loud but John reminded himself that no one could be able to hear it except him.
“What?” he whispered.
“I have a reading on a life form at this level.”
Now they were getting somewhere. “Show me,” he said.
An arrow appeared. It seemed to float in front of him and pointed in the direction he needed to go.
He followed the corridor around and wondered what he was going to find. He still had no idea what Ranulph was up to but he was more convinced than ever that it was no good.
John arrived at the door a few minutes later. He paused in front of it. Timothy had said there was someone on the other side of it but, even with his abilities, there was no way of knowing whether it was someone he wanted to meet. Yes it could be Stafford but it could also be one of the other 52 people apparently on the boat. On the other hand he wouldn't find out on this side of the door.
He checked his gun, braced himself and turned the handle.
He was thrown backwards into the wall. The whole thing shook and threatened to collapse. Someone was on top of him, their slippery hands around his neck trying to choke him.
John pushed as hard as he could but whoever it was they were stronger than him. He tried to get to the gun which had fallen away from him during the first attack.
He could feel his head filling with blood as his body raced to preserve his brain. He could do no more than slow down the inevitable and wait for a chance to fight back.
The chance came when he felt the leg on top of his slide away. Suddenly he was able to raise a knee and he lodged it firmly in the other persons genitals.
The other person cried out in pain and momentarily loosened their grip on John's throat. He seized the opportunity to push them away, roll out from under them and grab his gun.
A moment later he was on top of them, gun in his hand, ready to fire. He looked down into the face of his attacker.
“Stafford?”
He let go of the amphibious creature who couldn't see him and apparently didn't recognise his voice. Suddenly he was back on the ground having the life choked out of him.
“Staff it's me,” he choked. “John.”
The repetitive squeezing stopped but the hands still held him firmly. “John who?” he said.
“Kable. John Kable.”
Stafford released him and John backed away rubbing his neck. “What the hell?” he said.
“Sorry,” said Stafford, although John could still hear the anger in his voice, he was keyed up to fight.
John stood and offered his hand. He pulled Stafford up. “Come on,” he said. Someone must have heard them fighting, the boat wasn't quite big enough to hide a fight like that. “Let's get out of here before someone comes looking.”
“We can't,” said Stafford.
“What?”
“We can't go yet. There's something else we have to do first.”
John glanced up at the sound of footsteps above them. “What are you talking about?”
“There's about fifty clones on board,” said Stafford. “I don't know what he's planning to do with them...”
“...but whatever it is can't be good,” said John.
Stafford nodded and waited for John to take the lead. All the while the boot steps were getting closer and their options quickly running out.
“Do you know where?” said John.
Stafford shook his head.
“Timothy? Are you picking up a large number of bodies clustered in one area?”
A floating arrow appeared in front of him.
“This way,” he said and led Stafford along the dark corridor, fortunately away from the bodies coming around the corner.
19
John grabbed Stafford's arm and pushed him back against the wall.
“What is it?” Stafford whispered.
There was someone up ahead. A clone. She was dressed just as the one he had seen on the deck had been but that was no guarantee that it was the same person. He remembered how strong they had been and decided that, rather than reply to Stafford he would punch him in the stomach to get him to shut up. He may also have still been feeling some resentment for the earlier attack by his friend.
The clone stood in front of an unremarkable door. She had her arms by her side and did not seem to be aware of their presence.
“Sir, I detect 49 bodies on the other side of that door,” said Timothy. It was what John had expected but it didn't make the news any more welcome.
There was two of them and only one of her but still it did not seem that getting through the door would be a simple task.
John tapped Stafford on the shoulder and tried to indicate that he should follow him. He wasn't sure whether he managed to get the message across or not. He walked silently towards the door hoping that the clone didn't have enhanced vision as well as enhanced strength.
“Sally?” said a voice from along the corridor.
The clone turned. John froze and put a hand out to stop Stafford going any further.
“Come up on deck, I need a hand with this.”
The clone was only about two metres away from John. She turned and seemed to examine the darkness. Apparently satisfied that there was no one there she walked away and through a door at the other end of the corridor.
“Now lets just hope they haven't locked it,” he said, as much to himself as to Stafford. But Stafford laughed anyway.
The door was, of course, locked. There was a simple digital number pad which John wouldn't have had any trouble decrypting but he didn't need to because the door was as fragile as the rest of the boat and with a little pressure he was able to force it off its hinges.
Three Stories Tall Page 14
