by Mark Walden
Lucy gasped in surprise.
‘I don’t want to hear one more word from you or the last thing to go through your head will be a nine-millimetre bullet. Now MOVE!’
‘I’m sorry, sir,’ the frightened-looking security technician said. ‘Half of our staff are still recovering from the effects of the gas that was pumped in here and half the surveillance net is still down after the system outages this morning.’
‘I don’t want excuses!’ Nero shouted. ‘I want you to find him . . . now!’
He could almost feel the rage bubbling inside him as he watched the beleaguered security team desperately trying to track down Cypher. He cursed himself for ever letting him out of his cell.
H.I.V.E.mind’s computer-generated face suddenly appeared on the monitor in front of Nero.
‘I believe I have located Cypher,’ H.I.V.E.mind said calmly. ‘He has just entered the hangar bay. He is not alone.’
The screen switched to a feed from one of the cameras that was still functioning correctly. It showed Cypher walking across the landing pad towards the Shroud being prepped for launch. Nero realised with horror who the three figures walking in front of him were: Laura, Shelby and Lucy, the three students who had been standing in his office just a short while ago. He did not want to think about how Cypher would have taken them from Chief Lewis. As Nero watched, the guard who was standing near the loading ramp turned and saw him just a split second too late. Cypher calmly raised his gun and shot the guard in the chest, his lifeless body crumpling to the floor.
‘Damn it,’ Nero cursed, punching the metal of the security console. ‘Put me on the speakers down there.’
Down in the hangar bay the ground crew ran for cover. The pilot of the Shroud was halfway down the loading ramp when he saw the pistol pointing at him.
‘I suggest you return to the flight deck and continue your preparations for launch,’ Cypher said. ‘We’ll be leaving shortly.’
The pilot nodded, swallowing nervously, and hurried back up the ramp.
‘Cypher,’ Nero’s voice boomed out from the speakers mounted in the crater walls, ‘do you really think I’m going to let you go?’
‘You know, I’m not sure, Max,’ Cypher said calmly. ‘So tell me, just in case you don’t, which of these three children would you like to watch die first?’ He pointed the pistol at the three girls. ‘I’m going to count to five. If the crater is not opening by then I’ll just have to pick one of them at random, won’t I?’
‘One . . .’
Laura, Lucy and Shelby looked at each other nervously.
‘Two . . .’
Up in the security control room Nero knew that Cypher held all the cards.
‘Three . . .’
Cypher cocked the hammer on the pistol.
‘Four . . .’
‘H.I.V.E.mind, open the crater,’ Nero said, knowing he had no option.
Down in the hangar the huge steel shutters that sealed the landing bay began to rumble open.
‘Time to go,’ Cypher said to the girls. ‘Get on board NOW!’
As Cypher climbed the ramp behind them, Nero’s voice came over the speakers again.
‘You’re a dead man,’ Nero said. ‘I intend to see to that personally.’
‘That’s always been your speciality, hasn’t it, Max?’ Cypher said with an evil smile. ‘Empty threats.’
Nero watched helplessly as the Shroud’s loading ramp closed. Just a few moments later it lifted from the pad, climbing up and out of the crater.
‘We still have surface-to-air defences, sir,’ one of the security techs nearby said. ‘We can bring that Shroud down before it cloaks.’
‘No, let him go,’ Nero said. ‘I know where he’s headed.’ He turned to the technician on the comms desk. ‘Get me Raven.’
.
Chapter Eight
Carlos Chavez looked out of his office window over the sprawling buildings below. Rio was a city of contrasts; one could move from opulent luxurious suburbs to the worst of slums with just a five-minute walk. Like many such cities that existed around the world, that meant, for him at least, that business was good. He had an interest in almost every criminal enterprise not just here but all over South America. Some of the old guard of G.L.O.V.E., people like Nero, might have looked down their noses at such unsophisticated success, but they could not argue with the money that it pumped into their organisations’ coffers. Chavez had started his career in the slums that you could just see from his office window, and he had little doubt that the person who would eventually replace him would come from the very same favelas. It was of little concern to him; he had his eye on a larger prize.
He sat back down at his desk and reviewed the latest reports from his many operatives. It was not unusual for the governments within his domain to be riddled with corruption so there was little challenge in ensuring that the great and the good ultimately answered to him, but he was still pleased to see that people owned by him were in all the prime positions. He simply had to be vigilant that, like the mighty river that ran through his home country, the flow of dirty money headed in the right directions.
The phone on his desk rang and he answered it.
‘This is Chavez.’
He listened to the voice on the other end for less than a minute before replacing the receiver. A broad smile spread across his face as he realised that the prey he had been hunting had just walked directly into his cross hairs. It was going to be almost too easy to finish the job. Just a simple squeeze of the trigger.
He stood up from behind his desk and walked over to his private elevator. He felt a momentary twinge of concern as he pressed the button at the bottom of the panel – they had all seen what happened to Madame Mortis in Paris – but the only alternative was to take the stairs, and he would not lower himself to that, no matter what the risk.
The elevator stopped at a floor of his office building that very few knew about. He stepped out of the carriage and on to the long balcony that looked out over the underground training area. Below him more than a dozen men were practising unarmed combat or shooting on the range. He felt a twinge of pride as he watched them. These were not mere foot soldiers; they were the best of the best, his Lobos.
He walked down the short flight of stairs and quickly spotted his most trusted lieutenant.
‘Rafael, I need to talk to you,’ he said, beckoning the man over. The lieutenant’s arms were decorated with scars – not the clumsy random remnants of wounds, but beautifully carved patterns that he had cut into himself with one of the pair of razor-sharp machetes that hung from his belt. He was muscular, but not heavy, and his head was shaved but for a thin immaculately trimmed strip that ran down the centreline of his skull. It was said that he had killed a thousand men. Such talk was usually just macho posturing in Latin America, but in this case it was very possibly true.
‘What can I do for you, boss?’ Rafael asked.
‘You know the target I have had you and your men training to take down?’
‘Corvo,’ Rafael replied. ‘You know where she is?’
‘Yes. She is here.’
‘Here in Rio?’ Rafael asked, looking surprised. ‘Do you think she knows what we’ve been planning?’
‘No,’ Chavez said. ‘If that were the case we would simply not have woken up one morning. No, I think this is something else.’
‘A coincidence?’ Rafael asked. ‘In my experience there is no such thing.’
‘Call it providence then,’ Chavez said with a slight smile, ‘but this may be our best . . . shot. She is meeting someone in less than an hour’s time.’
‘Where?’
Chavez told him.
‘Good – one road in, one road out,’ Rafael said with a nod. ‘That makes me think she is not expecting a trap.’
‘Be careful not to underestimate her, Rafael,’ Chavez said. ‘You won’t find anyone still breathing who has.’
‘She’s just one woman,’ Rafael said with a predatory grin. �
��How dangerous can she be?’
Raven parked the 4x4 in the car park at the bottom of the long flight of stairs leading up to the summit of Mount Corcovado. She opened the kitbag and slipped a tactical harness across her shoulders. Then she left her swords in the bag and grabbed a light jacket from inside, putting it on over the harness.
‘Stay here,’ Raven said, slinging the bag over her shoulder. ‘When I’m done, we’ll rendezvous with the Shroud that’s being sent to take you back to H.I.V.E.’
‘I am not returning without Otto,’ Wing said firmly.
‘You’ll do what you’re damn well told,’ Raven said firmly. ‘Nero wants you back, and I’ve made it a habit never to argue with him.’
‘That is most obedient of you,’ Wing said with just the barest hint of sarcasm.
‘Don’t push it,’ Raven said with a frown. ‘I can just as easily take you there unconscious in the car boot.’
She walked away from the car, looking up to see what it was that drew so many tourists here.
There, above her, at the peak, was the forty-metre-tall statue of Christ the Redeemer, his arms outstretched, looking down over the city of Rio de Janeiro. The majority of tourists were taking the escalators that led up to the upper level, but Raven took the stairs. She jogged up the hundred and fifty steps to the observation deck at the foot of the statue, taking them three at a time. Just as she reached the deck her Blackbox began to bleep and she pulled it out of her pocket.
The screen flashed ‘INCOMING CALL – NERO’.
She put the slim black device back in her pocket without answering. She was busy. She was on a mission. It had absolutely nothing to do with the smart-assed ‘obedient’ comment that Wing had just made. At least, that’s what she was going to keep telling herself.
She walked across the observation deck, glancing at the tourists milling around her. She finally saw the person she was there to meet, gazing out over the spectacular vista of the city below. He looked older than she remembered, but then it had been ten years since she last saw him.
‘So they finally put you out to pasture, did they?’ Raven asked as she walked up behind him.
‘Natalya!’ the white-haired man said, turning and engulfing her in a bear hug.
‘Hello, Esteban,’ Raven said.
He took her by both shoulders and examined her at arm’s length.
‘Let me look at you,’ he said with a broad smile. ‘Still just as beautiful as ever. Have you found yourself a good man yet?’
‘It’s not high on my list of priorities,’ Raven said, glancing around at the faces in the crowd.
‘Not to worry, there is still time, you are still young.’
‘Not that young any more,’ Raven said. ‘It’s a long time since Cuba.’
‘Ah yes, good times.’ He laughed. ‘They still haven’t rebuilt that dam, you know.’
‘So you’re retired now, I hear,’ Raven said.
‘As much as people like us can ever retire from this damned game,’ Esteban replied with a slight smile. ‘It gets in the blood, you know.’
He turned and looked up at the enormous sculpture of Christ. ‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it? You know there’s even a small chapel in the base of the statue, should you feel the need to attend confession.’
‘You know I’m not a believer. Besides . . . I’m not the one with something to confess, am I, Esteban? You said you had information for me,’ Raven said with a frown, ‘but that was a lie, wasn’t it?’
‘Natalya, what do you mean?’ he asked, a hint of uncertainty in his voice.
‘I really thought I could trust you, after everything we have been through together, but the fact that there are six armed men, who are not as well trained as they think they are, evenly spaced in the crowd around us tells me otherwise,’ she said, looking down at the city below. The smile vanished from Esteban’s face.
‘I had forgotten how good you are,’ he said with a sigh. ‘I am sorry, Natalya, really I am, but Chavez runs this part of the world. You know that. He made it clear that anyone who wanted to continue to operate in Latin America was to give him any information that they had about you. If he had found out that I talked to you but didn’t tell him . . .’
‘He wouldn’t have found out,’ Raven said calmly. ‘Unlike you, I understand the concept of loyalty. Tell me the truth – how big’s the bounty on my head?’
‘Just give yourself up to them, Natalya,’ Esteban said. ‘It will be much easier that way. You must know you can’t get away.’
‘You should be grateful that you and I have been through so much together, Esteban,’ Raven said, suddenly looking straight at him.
‘Why?’ He edged away from her slightly. The look in her eyes was pure ice.
‘Because I am going to kill every single one of these men, and it would have been a lot easier if I could have used you as a human shield. Goodbye – and pray you never see me again.’
Raven smoothly shed her jacket and unclipped a pair of smoke grenades from her tactical harness. She stepped away from Esteban and screamed, ‘OH MY GOD! HE’S GOT A BOMB!’ first in Portuguese and then in English. Simultaneously she popped the pins from the cylinders in both hands with her thumbs and rolled the hissing canisters across the floor towards Esteban.
Then all hell broke loose.
Wing sat in the car, watching as tourists filed on to the escalators that led up to the observation deck. He felt frustrated. He was determined not to return to H.I.V.E. without finding Otto, but he also realised that mounting a search on his own would be pointless. He had no idea where to even start looking and none of the contacts that Raven had. He glanced around the car park and noticed a large white van parked about fifty metres away. What caught his attention was the man in the front passenger seat, who was talking into a walkie-talkie. As Wing watched, he saw the man lower the radio and then lift up a compact sub-machine gun, pulling back the slide and releasing it to chamber the first round. There was no way that it could possibly be a coincidence; this meeting had to be a trap.
Suddenly there were screams of panic from the top of the escalators and people began to pour down in blind panic as a cloud of white smoke enveloped the platform at the top. Wing climbed out of the car and made his way across the car park towards the van. He circled around, making sure that he stayed in the blind spot of the wing mirrors, and crept up to the rear doors. Dropping down, he slid around to the driver’s side, creeping towards the open window. When he was directly underneath he took a deep breath and leapt up, reaching in, grabbing the surprised driver by the back of the neck and slamming his head forwards into the steering wheel, knocking him out cold. The man on the passenger side turned towards him, a shocked look on his face, just in time to see Wing pull the keys from the ignition and duck down out of sight.
The man burst out of the passenger door and ran around the back of the truck with his weapon raised, but Wing was nowhere to be seen, so he walked slowly forward, weapon twitching from side to side as he searched for a target.
Behind him, Wing dropped silently from the van roof, stepping forward and wrapping his arm round the man’s throat. The armed man struggled desperately, trying to point the barrel of his gun over his shoulder, but Wing grabbed it with his free hand, pointing it to the sky as the thrashing man pulled the trigger. Wing wrenched the gun from the man’s hand as he felt him weakening. Seconds later he went limp and Wing released his hold, letting him fall to the ground. Wing reached down and detached the man’s walkie-talkie from the front of his body armour, listening to the confused chatter that was coming over the radio. He did not understand much of what he heard – unlike Raven he had no knowledge of the local language – but one phrase in English suddenly caught his attention.
‘Bring the chopper in,’ the panicked voice yelled. ‘Bring it in now!’
Rafael leant out of the side of the military helicopter as it rose up around the mountain. The observation deck at the foot of the statue was obscured by a thick shroud of w
hite smoke and he could make out nothing of what was happening within the billowing cloud. All he could see were occasional muzzle flashes and a strange, flickering purple light that seemed to almost dance through the enveloping mist.
‘Get me in closer,’ he shouted at the pilot. ‘Clear that smoke.’
The helicopter banked towards the platform, the downdraught from its rotors blowing the smoke away to reveal a scene that made his blood run cold. Raven stood motionless in the middle of the deck, a black-bladed sword in each hand, their dripping tips lowered, pointing to the ground. Around her lay half a dozen bodies, Rafael’s best men. None of them were moving. The woman looked up at the helicopter and smiled as she slid the swords into the crossed scabbards on her back.
‘Take her out!’ Rafael yelled at the operative manning the mini-gun on the firing mount next to him. The man swung the heavy machine gun towards Raven, squeezing the trigger, the multi-barrelled cylinder spinning up and spitting out a metre-long tongue of fire with a deafening roar.
Raven was already moving, sprinting across the observation deck towards the escalators as the stream of heavy-calibre bullets chewed up the concrete behind her. She leapt on to the smooth steel plate between the two escalators, sliding gracefully down the fifty-metre ramp on her back. The top of the escalator disappeared in a cloud of debris as the mini-gun shredded the spot where she had been a split second before. She hit the ground running at the bottom of the slide, sprinting across the car park towards the waiting 4x4. All around her, terrified tourists were scrambling for cover in a blind panic. Raven suddenly saw Wing racing to meet her from the other side of the lot; he was carrying a sub-machine gun that he threw to her as they both sprinted for the black 4x4. Raven turned and fired at the helicopter as it rounded the statue at the top of the mountain, bullets pinging off the armoured glass of the cockpit. She knew that there was next to no chance of downing a military helicopter with a light weapon like that, but her strategy had the desired effect. The pilot of the chopper instinctively banked away from the incoming fire, disrupting his gunner’s aim and giving her and Wing the vital few seconds they needed to reach the car. Raven climbed into the driver’s seat and gunned the engine as Wing leapt in the other side. She floored the accelerator and spun the wheel, weaving between the fleeing sightseers and heading for the exit. In the air behind them the pilot of the helicopter regained his composure and banked the chopper hard, setting off in pursuit.
