Escape Velocity

by Mark Walden

  The Chief squinted at the screen and suddenly saw what the other man had spotted. Just for the most fleeting of instants the air at the top of one of the metal staircases leading up from the dock shimmered like a heat haze, and then it was gone. The Chief frowned. He had no idea what it was but he would never have spotted it. Perhaps, he grudgingly admitted to himself, the Phalanx really did deserve their reputation. Phalanx One turned away from the bank of monitors and barked an order into his wrist mic.

  ‘This is Phalanx One to all Phalanx units. We have an intruder in the school, identification unknown. Target is thermoptically camouflaged. Apprehend or terminate immediately.’

  ‘I’ll alert my patrols,’ the Chief said quickly.

  ‘Thank you, Chief, but that will not be necessary,’ Phalanx One said calmly. ‘Leave this to us.’

  The Contessa strode down the corridor towards the security control room, Phalanx One beside her.

  ‘I want this intruder found now!’ she spat angrily.

  ‘My men are fully deployed. Whoever they are, we’ll find them,’ Phalanx One said with quiet confidence.

  ‘We shall see,’ the Contessa replied sharply. ‘But just in case your confidence is misplaced I want to proceed with the extraction immediately.’

  ‘Very well,’ Phalanx One replied. ‘I will instruct the team to proceed.’

  ‘Good,’ the Contessa replied, ‘because I’m sure I don’t have to remind you of the consequences for all of us if Number One was to learn that this operation had failed.’

  Phalanx One nodded and spoke quickly into his communicator.

  ‘Phalanx One to extraction team, you are go to proceed with the operation. Repeat: you are go for extraction. Have the Shroud crew complete pre-flight checks now. I don’t want the package sitting on the landing pad while they finish their prep, understood?’

  He received positive responses from his team and gave a quick nod to the Contessa.

  ‘It’s done.’

  The Phalanx team pushed the four gurneys quickly down the corridor. Otto, Wing, Shelby and Laura lay unconscious, strapped to the wheeled beds.

  ‘Extraction team to Shroud, we’re inbound to the launch bay, ETA two minutes,’ the leader reported briskly.

  Suddenly the overhead lights blinked out, plunging the corridor into darkness. There was a clattering rattle as at least one of the gurneys was pushed into the back of another, followed by a whispered curse.

  ‘This is Phalanx extraction team,’ the leader whispered into his communicator. ‘We’ve lost lights in the launch pad approach corridor. I need emergency lighting.’

  In the blackness ahead of the team there was a sudden soft hum and two mysterious lines of crackling violet light appeared in mid-air.

  ‘Emergency lighting – now!’ the leader of the squad barked into the communicator.

  The lines of light began to move rhythmically, getting closer and closer to the extraction team in the pitch-black corridor. There was no sound other than the slightly panicked breathing of the Phalanx operatives.

  The corridor was suddenly bathed in blood-red light as the emergency illumination kicked in. The extraction team leader just had time to gasp before a lithe figure clad from head to toe in jet-black armour was on him. The dual katanas that the attacker wielded moved in a blur, the purple light that came from the energy field that enveloped the cutting edge of each blade leaving trails in the air. The Phalanx leader raised his forearm to protect his neck from one blade, bracing himself for the blade to cut deep into the flesh of his arm. The sword struck but there was no cut, instead it felt like his arm had been hit with a baseball bat. The second blade swung into his stomach, knocking the wind from him but again leaving no laceration. He doubled over and his assailant knocked him out cold with a swift knee to the chin.

  ‘We’re under attack!’ the man behind the second gurney yelled into his communicator moments before one of the blades struck him in the side of the head. He slumped to the floor unconscious.

  The final two Phalanx operatives went for their shoulder holsters almost simultaneously. The black-clad figure thumbed a tiny control on the hilt of each sword and the energy fields surrounding the blades flared for an instant. The dual swords swept through the air as the two men raised their weapons, fingers tightening on the triggers. There was no gunfire, instead the neatly severed barrels of both guns clattered to the floor. The two men froze, their attacker between them, arms outstretched with the blades that had destroyed their weapons a moment before hovering millimetres from their throats. Both of them dropped what was left of their pistols to the floor and slowly raised their hands. The armoured figure pressed the controls on the hilts of both swords again and spun in a blur, delivering blunt stunning blows to both men’s skulls and they crumpled like puppets with their strings cut.

  The intruder moved quickly to the first gurney, checked Otto’s pulse and took a small injector gun from their belt and pressed it to his neck. There was a quick, sharp hiss and moments later Otto let out a soft groan. He opened his eyes and let out an involuntary yelp at the jet-black insectile armoured mask that was looking down at him. The figure pressed a concealed switch on the side of the mask and there was a brief hiss of escaping gas.

  ‘Good, you’re alive,’ Raven said as she pulled the mask from her face.

  ‘You took the words right out of my mouth,’ Otto said with a grin, his voice croaky.

  ‘You should never believe what you read in G.L.O.V.E.’s obituaries – surely you know that by now,’ Raven said with a slight smile.

  ‘A villain never stays dead for long,’ Otto replied chuckling.

  ‘Not the good ones anyway,’ Raven replied. She quickly undid the straps holding Otto to the bed and helped him to his feet. ‘Come on, we have to get moving. I took these guys by surprise but their back-up will be here any minute and I’d rather not go up against a full Phalanx squad right now.’ With that she turned and set off down the corridor.

  ‘Wait!’ Otto said sharply. ‘What about the others?’

  ‘No time,’ Raven replied. ‘I’m here for you and only you, Mr Malpense. Let’s go.’

  ‘No way,’ Otto said firmly. ‘Either we all go or none of us do. The only way you’ll get me out of here without the others is if you’re carrying my unconscious body.’

  Raven stopped and studied Otto for a moment.

  ‘Nine stone,’ Otto said with a sigh, rolling his eyes.

  ‘Too heavy,’ Raven replied matter of factly. ‘I’ll wake them, you undo their straps – and make it quick. We’re already behind schedule.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ the Contessa spat at Chief Lewis as she stormed into the security control centre.

  ‘We’re not sure,’ the Chief replied. ‘We’ve lost contact with the extraction team. It looks like someone deliberately cut power to the corridor they were in – someone who knew their way around H.I.V.E.’s systems, I might add.’

  ‘Where’s Phalanx One?’ the Contessa said impatiently.

  ‘He took a team down to the area where we lost contact with the extraction team. He left a couple of minutes ago,’ Lewis replied, suddenly glad that the operation had not been his responsibility.

  ‘Got them!’ one of the nearby surveillance technicians yelled.

  ‘On the main screen,’ the Chief ordered. He could not help but smile as he looked at the footage from the landing pad access corridor. There were the four pupils who had been scheduled for extraction and there was no mistaking the figure that ran ahead of them down the corridor.

  ‘Raven,’ the Contessa hissed in a voice that turned the Chief’s blood cold. ‘Lock the school down, seal every exit. Whatever happens she is not getting off this island. I’m going to make her wish she’d stayed dead.’

  Raven poked her head around the corner and, seeing that the way to the hangar-bay door was clear, she beckoned for the others to follow.

  ‘That’s it,’ Shelby said as they ran along behind Raven. ‘From now on no one�
�s dead until I read the autopsy report.’

  ‘Such a report could be faked,’ Wing observed.

  ‘Hey, only people who haven’t come back from the grave get to have an opinion,’ Shelby said quickly. ‘So that counts you out, zombie boy.’

  ‘Strictly speaking I am not a zombie since I did not actually die,’ Wing said. As usual it was impossible to tell if he was joking or not.

  ‘Cut it out, you two,’ Laura said. While Shelby may have been hiding her nerves with wisecracks – and it was debatable whether or not Wing ever actually got nervous – Laura seemed obviously unsettled by the events of the past few minutes. ‘What’s going on?’ she asked Otto.

  ‘Your guess is as good as mine,’ Otto said with an apologetic smile.

  ‘It can’t just be a coincidence that we were drugged and about to be carted off to God knows where and then suddenly Raven miraculously returns from the dead to save us.’

  ‘I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough,’ Otto said, trying to sound reassuring. He decided that it was probably not a good idea to tell her that if it had been up to Raven she’d still be lying strapped to a bed being transported to whatever undoubtedly disagreeable fate had been awaiting them.

  ‘H.I.V.E.mind,’ Raven said to the control panel mounted on the wall next to the huge blast doors that sealed the crater landing pad off from the rest of the school. Moments later H.I.V.E.mind’s hovering face appeared on the display set into the panel.

  ‘How may I be of assistance?’ H.I.V.E.mind said calmly.

  ‘Emergency access code Raven epsilon four nine two,’ Raven said quickly, ‘open the crater access doors.’

  ‘I am sorry to say that as of twenty-three seconds ago all of your clearances have been revoked,’ H.I.V.E.mind replied. ‘It would require an executive command from the school principal to restore your clearance.’

  ‘I somehow doubt that the Contessa is going to feel like restoring my access privileges,’ Raven said quickly. She turned to Otto and Laura. ‘Can either of you hack that panel?’

  ‘You mean you don’t know how to get through this door?’ Laura said, sounding stressed. ‘Oh, this is a great escape plan.’

  ‘We got delayed,’ Raven said, shooting a recriminating glance at Otto. ‘They weren’t supposed to have had time to remove my access codes.’

  Suddenly they could all hear the sound of running feet from worryingly nearby.

  ‘No time for a hack,’ Otto said quickly. ‘Let me try something.’

  Raven stood to one side and Otto leant in close to the panel.

  ‘H.I.V.E.mind,’ he whispered, ‘you owe me one, remember.’

  He stepped back from the panel and watched as H.I.V.E.mind tipped his head slightly to one side, a habitual response that Otto knew meant he was diverting a large proportion of his processing capacity towards solving a problem. After a couple of seconds he brought his head upright again and gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod and the blast doors slowly began to rise into the ceiling with a low rumble.

  ‘What did you do?’ Laura asked, clearly surprised.

  ‘Let’s just say I had a back door,’ Otto said, grinning. ‘Come on, get moving.’

  As the others ran past him into the crater bay Otto turned again to the control panel.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said, smiling at H.I.V.E.mind.

  ‘You are welcome,’ the AI replied.

  Otto turned to follow his friends.

  ‘Mr Malpense.’

  ‘Yes,’ Otto replied, looking back to the panel.

  ‘Good luck.’ H.I.V.E.mind smiled.

  ‘Thanks,’ Otto said and ran after the others.

  ‘I fear you shall need it,’ H.I.V.E.mind said to himself, and the display went dark.

  .

  Chapter Five

  Raven ran into the control room on one side of the crater launch pad to find a single technician at the control console. He looked like he’d seen a ghost, which she realised with a twinge of amusement was probably entirely accurate from his perspective.

  ‘Open the launch doors, now!’ she barked as she strode across the room towards him. He went even paler and for a moment looked like he might be about to faint.

  ‘I c-c-can’t,’ he stammered. ‘The Contessa’s locked the whole island down.’

  ‘Yes, but I know that you have a master override key in case of an emergency landing. Well, this is an emergency launch and that’s almost the same thing, so where’s the key?’ She pulled one of her swords from its scabbard on her back and put the crackling tip under the terrified technician’s chin.

  Without another word of protest the technician pulled a chain from around his neck with a single key attached. Raven lowered her blade and the technician slotted the key into the control panel in front of him and turned it. Far overhead massive motors spun into life and began to pull back the giant armoured shutters that sealed off the crater. Raven waited for the few seconds it took for the shutters to retract far enough and then jammed her katana straight into the control panel. The crackling energy from the blade made the electronics within the panel fizz and pop and terminal-looking black smoke billowed from every crack.

  ‘Now get on the floor with your hands on your head and stay there till we’re gone,’ Raven said calmly, backing out of the door.

  Otto and the others ran for the Shroud that sat on the landing pad. Its rear loading ramp was down and various palettes of equipment lay scattered around that someone had been in the process of unloading. Raven ran past them and straight up the ramp, heading for the cockpit. Otto followed her, climbing the ladder to the cockpit behind her and flopping down into the co-pilot’s seat. Raven started to flick switches and check displays as the Shroud’s systems flared into life.

  ‘What can I do?’ Otto asked as Raven shot a worried look through the cockpit window at the blast doors on the other side of the crater. They were sealed for now but if she knew the Phalanx they would not remain that way for long.

  ‘We don’t have time for a full pre-flight check,’ Raven said quickly. ‘Do a circuit of the exterior and make sure that we’re ready to go as soon as the aeronautics and stealth systems are up.’

  ‘OK,’ Otto said and he scrambled back down the ladder. The others were strapping themselves in to the seats that lined the lower compartment. Wing looked thoroughly unconcerned by the whole situation, simply glancing up at Otto as he ran past.

  ‘What, you forget the in-flight meals?’ Shelby shouted after him as he ran down the landing ramp. ‘Vegetarian, please!’

  ‘This isn’t funny, Shel,’ Laura said, sounding nervous. ‘We need to get out of here. We don’t know where they were taking us before Raven turned up and I, for one, am not keen to find out.’

  Otto ran back through the passenger compartment and shouted up the ladder to the cockpit.

  ‘Landing clamps are still engaged!’

  ‘I know,’ Raven replied from above. ‘I can’t disengage them and there’s no way to override it from here.’

  ‘Swords!’ Otto shouted back up the ladder. ‘Both of them, now!’

  Moments later the twin scabbards from Raven’s back fell through the hatch from above.

  ‘Make it quick,’ Raven shouted down as the Shroud’s engines slowly started to spin up to full speed with a low rumble.

  Otto tossed one of the swords to Wing and ran past, gesturing for him to follow outside.

  Otto looked at the tiny controls on the hilt of the sword he carried. The swords had been custom built for Raven by Professor Pike at the time of Cypher’s attack on the school and they were quite unique. The cutting edge of each blade was surrounded by a variable geometry forcefield that could be shaped to give each sword a blunt non-lethal striking edge or an impossibly sharp mono-molecular blade that could quite literally slice through anything.

  ‘How do these things work?’ Otto asked Wing. He had seen Raven and Wing sparring with the blades in the past and he hoped he might be able to set them correctly.

&nb
sp; ‘Here, let me,’ Wing said and took the sword from Otto. He thumbed the controls and drew the glowing katana from its scabbard carefully. ‘What do you need?’ he asked.

  ‘I need you to cut through those,’ Otto said, pointing at the heavy metal clamps that were locked firmly on to each of the Shroud’s landing struts. Wing looked closely at the nearest clamp and touched the sword’s controls again, the blade glowing more brightly, emitting a barely audible high-pitched whine.

  ‘There, that should be enough,’ Wing said, handing the sword back to Otto carefully. ‘Use with caution – that will cut through anything.’

  ‘Right,’ Otto replied with a slight smile. ‘Keep limbs out of the way.’

  ‘Unless you have no further use for them,’ Wing replied with a straight face.

  Otto moved to the other side of the Shroud and watched as Wing expertly sliced through the first clamp. There was the barest hiss as the blade passed through the dense metal and then both halves of the restraint fell away and clattered to the floor. Otto turned back to the clamp in front of him and swung his own sword just as Wing had just done. Otto struck hard but the total lack of resistance as the blade swung through the device caught him off guard. He might as well have been swinging the blade through thin air for all of the difference that it seemed to make. He managed to stop the blade’s swing once it was several inches deep in the solid steel decking and only millimetres from his own foot. The clamp fell apart.

  Suddenly there was an almighty explosion from the other side of the cavern which sent one of the massive blast doors flying a dozen metres through the air, landing with a clang. Smoke billowed from the ruined doorway and darting figures were barely visible within the cloud.

  ‘I suspect now would be a good time to leave,’ Wing said quickly, slicing through the other anchor on his side of the Shroud. As if in response, the Shroud’s engines roared fully into life and the transport began to pull itself free from the ruined restraints. One clamp remained engaged, however, and the Shroud lurched to one side, still shackled to the pad. Otto raced over to the last tether and swung the glowing sword again, more carefully this time. There was a crunch as the final landing strut pulled itself free and the Shroud immediately rose a few metres into the air, gently rotating.