by Rob Stevens
The female guard stalked towards him, suddenly throwing a straight punch at his face. Blocking the blow, Archie snapped out a fist that struck his opponent in the stomach, doubling her over. Grabbing her ankles he hoisted her over the railing, then turned to face the next guard, who was waiting to attack.
This one launched a roundhouse kick that Archie ducked before sweeping away her standing foot with his leg. As the female guard crashed on to the metal walkway he rolled her under the railing, listening for the imminent whump.
The next guard charged immediately, landing a punch on Archie’s cheek before he could react. As he reeled backwards the guard followed up with another punch. Recovering quickly, Archie grabbed her wrist, rocked backwards and sat down. He pressed the sole of his foot into her stomach and tossed her over his head before jumping up to face his next battle.
He dispatched guard number five with a spinning kick that connected with her shoulder and sent her sprawling over the edge of the gangway.
The last guard attacked with a flurry of punches, striking Archie square on the nose and snapping his head back. Shaking off the blow, he noticed, behind the guard, a hole in the gangway fitted with a metal ladder leading to the sub’s lower level. Sensing an opportunity, he responded with a barrage of his own, forcing her back along the walkway with stiff blows to her body.
Just a metre before the hole the guard seemed to recover her composure and stood her ground, squaring up to Archie. Maintaining his momentum, he skipped on to his left foot, driving out his right leg like a piston and striking her square in the chest. With a breathless groan she stumbled backwards, unable to stop herself stepping into the hole, and disappeared from view.
Archie glanced through the hole to see the guard slumped on the gloomy deck below.
Shaking his head, he muttered, ‘What a dropout.’
But when he turned to give Barney and Gemma the all-clear his sense of victory turned instantly to cold terror.
The guard he had thrown over his shoulder had recovered and was sneaking up behind Barney. Her right hand – raised above her head – was holding a long curved knife, which she was about to bring down into his back.
‘Look out!’ Archie yelled.
Barney spun round, freezing in terror at the sight of his would-be assassin wielding her weapon.
With deadly intent the guard swung the knife downward. A full five metres away, Archie watched helplessly as the knife flashed towards his friend.
Gemma acted instantly – shoulder-barging Barney out of the knife’s path.
As the blade now slashed down at her own face Gemma flicked out a hand, catching the guard’s wrist and twisting it back. The female assassin swung her free fist angrily but Gemma’s reactions were quicker. Blocking her opponent’s blow with her forearm, Gemma landed a punch on the guard’s chin, sending her reeling on to the deck and rolling over the edge of the gangway.
Barney scratched his tight blond curls and shook his head in bewilderment. ‘You . . . you saved my life. Thank you, X-ray.’
‘You’re welcome.’ Gemma shrugged, smiling briefly. ‘But I won’t be bragging about it and I think it’s better for both our reputations if no one finds out. Ever.’
Barney nodded once. ‘Consider it a code Six Quebec incident.’
‘Whatever.’ Gemma shrugged.
‘That was awesome, Agent X-ray,’ Archie enthused, arriving on the scene. ‘I had no idea you were combat trained.’
‘I’m not just a pretty face you know,’ Gemma mumbled.
‘No, you’re not,’ Archie said emphatically. ‘What I mean is that you’re more than just a pretty face. I didn’t mean No, you’re not pretty because clearly you are . . . very pretty.’ Archie could feel his mouth drying up and his throat tightening. ‘Isn’t she, Zulu?’
Barney just grinned at Archie, whose face was turning a deep plum colour.
The awkward silence was interrupted by a female voice crackling from one of the guard’s walkie-talkies that was lying on the walkway.
‘Cougar Squad, this is Queen Bee, do you read? Do we have a code nine? I repeat, do we have a code nine?’
Archie, Barney and Gemma stared at the radio for a moment, then Barney picked it up and slowly raised it to his mouth.
‘Keep it simple,’ Gemma whispered.
Clearing his throat, Barney pressed the transmit switch and, in a high-pitched voice, replied, ‘Queen Bee, from Cougar Squad. Negative on the code nine. I repeat, negative. Over.’
The STINKBOMB agents held their breath and waited to hear if Barney’s ruse had worked. After a few seconds the response crackled through the radio.
‘Roger that, Cougar Squad. Stand down and return to the Command Deck.’
Archie exhaled loudly and Gemma nodded, both relieved that their cover hadn’t been blown. Then Barney pressed the transmit button on the walkie-talkie again. ‘Copy that and roger wilco,’ he squeaked. ‘I think it must have been a false alarm – probably a level three breach caused by some sort of hydroplutonic power surge in the . . . er . . . flux capacitor.’
Archie was shaking his head frantically while Gemma made furious cutting gestures across her throat – but Barney continued.
‘We’ve checked the sector-six perimeter and we’ll conduct a sweep of the alpha-nine modules, then RV at the Command Deck. Over.’
‘Cougar Squad, your last transmission was garbled. Did you say a hydroplutonic power surge?’
Before Barney could say any more, Archie snatched the radio from his hand and tossed it over the railing – giving a nod of finality when he heard it shatter on impact.
‘What did you do that for?’ Barney complained.
‘It slipped,’ Archie lied. ‘Sorry.’
‘Shame,’ Gemma added. ‘And you were doing such a good job of keeping it simple too.’
‘We’d better get moving,’ Archie urged. ‘The Command Deck is bound to be near the front of the sub. Come on.’
Archie turned and jogged along the metal gangway hurdling the manhole the sixth guard had fallen through. Gemma followed, skipping over the void, while Barney stepped gingerly across, nervously gripping both handrails.
A short distance along the gloomy corridor they came to a closed doorway in a wall of solid steel. Unscrewing the handle, Archie opened the hatch and ducked through tentatively.
He found himself on another metal gangway leading through a compartment crammed with machinery and pipes. A ladder through a manhole disappeared into the gloom both above and below.
‘This place seems much bigger than I thought it was,’ Archie sighed.
‘That’s pretty standard.’ Barney nodded wisely. ‘Odious masterminds’ hideouts often look pretty small from the outside but actually seem to go on forever on the inside.’
‘OK, let’s split up,’ Archie suggested. ‘I’ll take the ladder up. Zulu, you investigate this level, and X-ray, you climb down to the level below. Meet back here in five minutes . . . unless one of us finds what we’re looking for. Stay in touch.’ Archie tapped his earpiece and the other two agents nodded.
Archie climbed ten rungs and clambered through a hole on to another gangway. The walls of the cramped corridor were also lined with networks of intertwined pipes, festooned with valves and pressure gauges. Every so often a jet of steam would puncture the eerie silence with a spiteful hiss.
Archie was beginning to feel claustrophobic. He felt an immense desire to see the sky and the sun and spread his arms wide. Staring along the walkway, he felt as if the walls were going to press together, squashing him flat.
Seeing no more guards, he forced himself to head towards the middle of the ship. He was conscious of his footsteps clanging on the metal gangway but he knew the time for stealth had passed. He reckoned Tension would probably have grown suspicious about her missing henchwomen by now, and was probably monitoring him on her CCTV.
Regardless of whether Evelyn Tension was aware of his presence or not, he had to rescue Adam Winchester and expose the fake PM before the
midnight deadline, and to achieve that he had to move fast. Alerting her to STINKBOMB’s presence was a risk he had to take.
Through an open hatch he found a long compartment crammed with bunks stacked three high and end to end. The only privacy afforded in the sleeping quarters was a curtain across each bed. As he edged along the narrow corridor between the bunks Archie noticed that the curtain on the far-right bed on the top level was drawn shut.
Trying not to make a sound, he crept along until he was next to the bed. Taking a quiet, deep breath he reached out and pinched the edge of the curtain between his fingers. Unsure whether he was about to come face to face with another murderous guard or a terrified Prime Minister, he steeled himself for action.
With a flick of his wrist he snapped the curtain back.
He gasped.
The bed was empty.
With his heart still hammering, Archie started making his way back to the ladder he’d just climbed.
‘STINKBOMB, this is Yankee,’ he murmured. ‘Nothing but sleeping quarters on the top level. Empty sleeping quarters.’
‘This is Zulu. The middle level leads deep into the engine room. The eagle has left the henhouse. We have a code green situation and a negative on Darth Vader. Over.’
‘Come in, X-ray,’ Archie ordered, climbing on to the top rung of the ladder. ‘What’s your position?’
Archie paused as he waited for Gemma’s response.
Silence.
‘X-ray, this is Yankee. Do you copy?’
Again there was silence, then . . .
‘This is X-ray.’ Gemma sounded shaken, breathless. ‘Get down here now! I’m fifteen metres in front of the ladder. Stay low as you approach. I’m hiding behind a steel cylinder on the right of the gangway – and you are not going to believe what I’ve found.’
Lightly gripping the ladder’s vertical stringers, Archie slid down like a fireman descending a pole and dropped through the hole in the middle level.
Landing lightly at the foot of the ladder, Archie crouched low and ran towards the front of the submarine. After a short distance he was approaching an open hatch in a solid steel bulkhead when he spotted a large metal cylinder to his right and, in the half-light, a figure crouching behind it.
He scurried over and sat next to Gemma, resting his back against the giant drum.
‘Where’s Zulu?’ she asked.
‘He’s coming, I think,’ Archie replied, adjusting his spectacles. ‘Speak of the devil.’
Grunting and puffing, Barney was crawling along the floor on his elbows and knees. When he was level with the others, he rolled sideways towards them. Unfortunately he tumbled with too much vigour and his head hit the cylinder with a resounding clang.
‘What’s going down?’ he asked, rubbing his brow as he dragged himself up on to his knees.
‘Our chances of staying undercover after your arrival,’ Gemma muttered. She turned and peeked around the side of the steel drum. ‘Check it out,’ she said, jerking her head.
Archie and Barney peered cautiously through the open hatch and took in the scene that lay beyond.
‘So this is where the Queen Bee spins her evil web,’ Barney whispered.
Wide-eyed, Archie nodded. ‘I couldn’t have put it better myself.’
The walls of the circular room through the hatch were lined with steel panels containing knobs, levers, switches, dials and countless computer screens. The luminous green lines sweeping around numerous radar displays filled the air with an eerie glow.
Archie realised the two circular portholes, on opposite sides of the room, were designed to look like whale’s eyes from outside the sub. The telescopic column of the periscope reached from the floor to the domed ceiling, disappearing through the whale’s blowhole. Archie gasped as his eyes fixed on the terrifying scene in the middle of the room. Raised about a metre from the deck was a circular platform measuring three metres across. It was surrounded by a trench that was two metres wide and brimming with a bubbling turquoise fluid, like a toxic moat. A man, wearing a guard’s yellow jumpsuit, was spreadeagled on the round island and his wrists and ankles were clamped firmly down with steel manacles. He appeared to be conscious but a restraint around his neck gave him only limited movement of his head.
Suspended above the mini-stage was a large futuristic cannon. On top of its bulbous silver casing was a glass capsule containing a fluorescent orange liquid. The huge gun was tilted downward, shooting a single narrow beam of intense red light at the platform. Fizzing and hissing, it was scorching the metal, edging its way torturously between the prisoner’s legs.
Even though the captive’s nose and mouth were covered by a square of aluminium duct tape, and one of his eyes was bruised and swollen, Archie knew instantly who he was.
‘It’s Adam Winchester,’ he said in a barely audible whisper, his heart pumping fast.
‘Judging by his black eye he put up quite a struggle,’ Gemma noted.
‘It looks like Darth Vader is going to be on the wrong end of that light sabre if we don’t do something,’ said Barney.
‘Let’s just go in and get him,’ Gemma suggested.
‘We’d never get over that moat,’ Archie said. ‘I don’t know what that liquid is but it’s bound to be poisonous.’
‘Or violently acidic, or swarming with piranha fish,’ Barney suggested. ‘Oooh – or it might contain some sort of truth serum designed to make us give up state secrets . . .’
‘The state secret I want answered is who stole your brain,’ Gemma murmured.
Archie knelt down, ducking his head low to the floor so that he could see the ceiling of the Command Room.
About three metres off the ground a thick steel strut was suspended horizontally. One end was connected to a heavy-duty steel hinge that was bolted to the roof, while the free end supported a segment of metal walkway. The arrangement reminded Archie of a strange fairground ride, frozen at the height of its swing. He calculated that if the strut swung down into the vertical position, the segment of walkway would span the moat round the island.
‘It looks like Tension’s engineered an elaborate drawbridge,’ he commented, nodding at the ramp. ‘There must be a control panel somewhere to lower it into position.’
‘I suppose it would have been too easy to, like, slide a plank of wood across the gap or something,’ Gemma sneered.
‘But she is a true Evil Genius,’ Barney whispered with a hint of admiration. ‘In my experience of these people they never miss an opportunity to install some needlessly complicated mechanical contraptions.’
‘Remind me,’ Gemma muttered. ‘How many Odious Masterminds have you actually met?’
‘Doctor Doom,’ Barney answered, sticking a thumb up as if he was about to count off a long list on his fingers. He rolled his eyes skyward and bit his lip.
Gemma snorted derisorily. ‘Hang on, let me add them up . . . One.’
‘That’s still one more than you, if I’m not mistaken?’ Barney retorted.
‘That’s a very good point,’ Archie chuckled.
Gemma narrowed her eyes and smiled sarcastically.
‘OK, let’s concentrate on the matter in hand,’ Archie said firmly.
‘I say we go into the room and check it out,’ Gemma replied. ‘If we can find the controls for that bridge and unlock those manacles we might be able to get the PM out of there before anyone else even turns up.’
Archie considered the plan for a moment, then deciding it was about their only option, said, ‘OK. Let’s go.’
‘Wait!’ Barney gripped Archie’s arm urgently. ‘We need a go code.’
‘A go code?’ Archie repeated.
‘Yeah. It’s a secret phrase that tells your fellow agents that a mission is about to go live.’
‘Listen.’ Gemma fixed Barney with a hard stare. ‘We don’t have time for all your Hollywood jargon. You’re starting to really wind me up.’
‘It’s a teensy bit wordy,’ Barney said. ‘How about we just use th
e last bit?’
With a frustrated groan Gemma turned and ducked through the hatch into the Command Room. Archie went in behind her, then Barney hoisted himself to his feet and stepped through the doorway, muttering, ‘You’re starting to really wind me up. Copy all units, You’re starting to really wind me up.’
Archie turned as he walked into the Command Room, scanning the banks of control panels for something that might control the drawbridge. Gemma went straight to the bubbling blue moat surrounding Adam Winchester’s podium. Barney tiptoed in, unwrapping a Mars – one of five chocolate bars he had stashed inside his wetsuit.
‘We’ll never get across without the bridge,’ Gemma said, sizing up the chasm between her and the PM’s raised platform. Glancing up at Adam Winchester, she added, ‘Don’t worry your . . . excellence, sir, we’ll get you out of here.’
The Prime Minister’s desperate pleas were muffled by the tape over his mouth.
As Archie studied the mass of switches and levers on the walls he felt his eyes straining. Finding the correct control panel was like looking for a needle in a haystack. Meanwhile Barney was staring at an area of the wall immediately to the right of the hatch they had come through.
‘Check this out,’ he said idly, chomping away another inch of his Mars bar.
‘Not now, Zulu,’ Archie replied tetchily sweeping his eyes down a panel swimming with row upon row of tiny circuit breakers. ‘We need to find the control for the bridge before Tension discovers us.’
‘Copy that.’ Barney popped the last nub of chocolate into his mouth and scrunched up the wrapper. ‘I think I may have found it.’
‘What makes you think that?’ Archie queried, continuing his detailed study of the controls.
‘Because it’s a shiny new lever . . . And it’s labelled Bridge Control.’
Archie turned and stared at Barney, who was grinning at him – a line of chocolate around his lips – then ran over to examine the lever.
It was a six-inch column with a black plastic knob on the end. The shaft protruded from a slot in the panel shaped like a capital E. The lever was positioned in the topmost horizontal gate which was labelled with the letter ‘U’. The middle gate was labelled ‘D’ and the bottom one bore the letters ‘FF’, written in red.
